Читать книгу The Hidden Power And Other Papers upon Mental Science - Thomas Troward - Страница 5

To realise fully how much of our present daily life consists in symbols

is to find the answer to the old, old question, What is Truth? and in

the degree in which we begin to recognise this we begin to approach

Truth. The realisation of Truth consists in the ability to translate

symbols, whether natural or conventional, into their equivalents; and

the root of all the errors of mankind consists in the inability to do

this, and in maintaining that the symbol has nothing behind it. The

great duty incumbent on all who have attained to this knowledge is to

impress upon their fellow men that there is an _inner side_ to things,

and that until this _inner_ side is known, the things themselves are not

known.

There is an inner and an outer side to everything; and the quality of

the superficial mind which causes it to fail in the attainment of Truth

is its willingness to rest content with the outside only. So long as

this is the case it is impossible for a man to grasp the import of his

own relation to the universal, and it is this relation which constitutes

all that is signified by the word "Truth." So long as a man fixes his

attention only on the superficial it is impossible for him to make any

progress in knowledge. He is denying that principle of "Growth" which is

the root of all life, whether spiritual intellectual, or material, for

he does not stop to reflect that all which he sees as the outer side of

things can result only from some germinal principle hidden deep in the

centre of their being.

Expansion from the centre by growth according to a necessary order of

sequence, this is the Law of Life of which the whole universe is the

outcome, alike in the one great solidarity of cosmic being, as in the

separate individualities of its minutest organisms. This great principle

is the key to the whole riddle of Life, upon whatever plane we

contemplate it; and without this key the door from the outer to the

inner side of things can never be opened. It is therefore the duty of

all to whom this door has, at least in some measure, been opened, to

endeavour to acquaint others with the fact that there is an inner side

to things, and that life becomes truer and fuller in proportion as we

penetrate to it and make our estimates of all things according to what

becomes visible from this interior point of view.

In the widest sense everything is a symbol of that which constitutes its

inner being, and all Nature is a gallery of arcana revealing great

truths to those who can decipher them. But there is a more precise

sense in which our current life is based upon symbols in regard to the

most important subjects that can occupy our thoughts: the symbols by

which we strive to represent the nature and being of God, and the manner

in which the life of man is related to the Divine life. The whole

character of a man's life results from what he really believes on this

subject: not his formal statement of belief in a particular creed, but

what he realises as the stage which his mind has actually attained in

regard to it.

Has a man's mind only reached the point at which he thinks it is

impossible to know anything about God, or to make any use of the

knowledge if he had it? Then his whole interior world is in the

condition of confusion, which must necessarily exist where no spirit of

order has yet begun to move upon the chaos in which are, indeed, the

elements of being, but all disordered and neutralising one another. Has

he advanced a step further, and realised that there is a ruling and an

ordering power, but beyond this is ignorant of its nature? Then the

unknown stands to him for the terrific, and, amid a tumult of fears and

distresses that deprive him of all strength to advance, he spends his

life in the endeavour to propitiate this power as something naturally

adverse to him, instead of knowing that it is the very centre of his own

life and being.

And so on through every degree, from the lowest depths of ignorance to

the greatest heights of intelligence, a man's life must always be the

exact reflection of that particular stage which he has reached in the

perception of the divine nature and of his own relation to it; and as we

approach the full perception of Truth, so the life-principle within us

expands, the old bonds and limitations which had no existence in reality

fall off from us, and we enter into regions of light, liberty, and

power, of which we had previously no conception. It is impossible,

therefore, to overestimate the importance of being able to realise the

symbol _for_ a symbol, and being able to penetrate to the inner

substance which it represents. Life itself is to be realised only by the

conscious experience of its livingness in ourselves, and it is the

endeavour to translate these experiences into terms which shall suggest

a corresponding idea to others that gives rise to all symbolism.

The nearer those we address have approached to the actual experience,

the more transparent the symbol becomes; and the further they are from

such experience the thicker is the veil; and our whole progress consists

in the fuller and fuller translation of the symbols into clearer and

clearer statements of that for which they stand. But the first step,

without which all succeeding ones must remain impossible, is to convince

people that symbols _are_ symbols, and not the very Truth itself. And

the difficulty consists in this, that if the symbolism is in any degree

adequate it must, in some measure, represent the form of Truth, just as

the modelling of a drapery suggests the form of the figure beneath. They

have a certain consciousness that somehow they are in the presence of

Truth; and this leads people to resent any removal of those folds of

drapery which have hitherto conveyed this idea to their minds.

There is sufficient indication of the inner Truth in the outward form to

afford an excuse for the timorous, and those who have not sufficient

mental energy to think for themselves, to cry out that finality has

already been attained, and that any further search into the matter must

end in the destruction of Truth. But in raising such an outcry they

betray their ignorance of the very nature of Truth, which is that it can

never be destroyed: the very fact that Truth is Truth makes this

impossible. And again they exhibit their ignorance of the first

principle of Life--namely, the Law of Growth, which throughout the

universe perpetually pushes forward into more and more vivid forms of

expression, having expansion everywhere and finality nowhere.

Such ignorant objections need not, therefore, alarm us; and we should

endeavour to show those who make them that what they fear is the only

natural order of the Divine Life, which is "over all, and through all,

and in all." But we must do this gently, and not by forcibly thrusting

upon them the object of their terror, and so repelling them from all

study of the subject. We should endeavour gradually to lead them to see

that there is something interior to what they have hitherto held to be

ultimate Truth, and to realise that the sensation of emptiness and

dissatisfaction, which from time to time will persist in making itself

felt in their hearts, is nothing else than the pressing forward of the

spirit within to declare that inner side of things which alone can

satisfactorily account for what we observe on the exterior, and without

the knowledge of which we can never perceive the true nature of our

inheritance in the Universal Life which is the Life Everlasting.

What, then, is this central principle which is at the root of all

things? It is Life. But not life as we recognise it in particular forms

of manifestation; it is something more interior and concentrated than

that. It is that "unity of the spirit" which _is_ unity, simply because

it has not yet passed into diversity. Perhaps this is not an easy idea

to grasp, but it is the root of all scientific conception of spirit; for

without it there is no common principle to which we can refer the

innumerable forms of manifestation that spirit assumes.

It is the conception of Life as the sum-total of all its undistributed

powers, being as yet none of these in particular, but all of them in

potentiality. This is, no doubt, a highly abstract idea, but it is

essentially that of the centre from which growth takes place by

expansion in every direction. This is that last residuum which defies

all our powers of analysis. This is truly "the unknowable," not in the

sense of the unthinkable but of the unanalysable. It is the subject of

perception, not of knowledge, if by knowledge we mean that faculty which

estimates the _relations_ between things, because here we have passed

beyond any questions of relations, and are face to face with the

absolute.

This innermost of all is absolute Spirit. It is Life as yet not

differentiated into any specific mode; it is the universal Life which

pervades all things and is at the heart of all appearances.

To come into the knowledge of this is to come into the secret of power,

and to enter into the secret place of Living Spirit. Is it illogical

first to call this the unknowable, and then to speak of coming into the

knowledge of it? Perhaps so; but no less a writer than St. Paul has set

the example; for does he not speak of the final result of all searchings

into the heights and depths and lengths and breadths of the inner side

of things as being, to attain the knowledge of that Love which passeth

knowledge. If he is thus boldly illogical in phrase, though not in fact,

may we not also speak of knowing "the unknowable"? We may, for this

knowledge is the root of all other knowledge.

The presence of this undifferentiated universal life-power is the final

axiomatic fact to which all our analysis must ultimately conduct us. On

whatever plane we make our analysis it must always abut upon pure

essence, pure energy, pure being; that which knows itself and recognises

itself, but which cannot dissect itself because it is not built up of

parts, but is ultimately integral: it is pure Unity. But analysis which

does not lead to synthesis is merely destructive: it is the child

wantonly pulling the flower to pieces and throwing away the fragments;

not the botanist, also pulling the flower to pieces, but building up in

his mind from those carefully studied fragments a vast synthesis of the

constructive power of Nature, embracing the laws of the formation of all

flower-forms. The value of analysis is to lead us to the original

starting-point of that which we analyse, and so to teach us the laws by

which its final form springs from this centre.

Knowing the law of its construction, we turn our analysis into a

synthesis, and we thus gain a power of building up which must always be

beyond the reach of those who regard "the unknowable" as one with

"not-being."

_This_ idea of the unknowable is the root of all materialism; and yet no

scientific man, however materialistic his proclivities, treats the

unanalysable residuum thus when he meets it in the experiments of his

laboratory. On the contrary, he makes this final unanalysable fact the

basis of his synthesis. He finds that in the last resort it is energy of

some kind, whether as heat or as motion; but he does not throw up his

scientific pursuits because he cannot analyse it further. He adopts the

precisely opposite course, and realises that the conservation of energy,

its indestructibility, and the impossibility of adding to or detracting

from the sum-total of energy in the world, is the one solid and

unchanging fact on which alone the edifice of physical science can be

built up. He bases all his knowledge upon his knowledge of "the

unknowable." And rightly so, for if he could analyse this energy into

yet further factors, then the same problem of "the unknowable" would

meet him still. All our progress consists in continually pushing the

unknowable, in the sense of the unanalysable residuum, a step further

back; but that there should be no ultimate unanalysable residuum

anywhere is an inconceivable idea.

In thus realising the undifferentiated unity of Living Spirit as the

central fact of any system, whether the system of the entire universe or

of a single organism, we are therefore following a strictly scientific

method. We pursue our analysis until it necessarily leads us to this

final fact, and then we accept this fact as the basis of our synthesis.

The Science of Spirit is thus not one whit less scientific than the

Science of Matter; and, moreover, it starts from the same initial fact,

the fact of a living energy which defies definition or explanation,

wherever we find it; but it differs from the science of matter in that

it contemplates this energy under an aspect of responsive intelligence

which does not fall within the scope of physical science, as such. The

Science of Spirit and the Science of Matter are not opposed. They are

complementaries, and neither is fully comprehensible without some

knowledge of the other; and, being really but two portions of one whole,

they insensibly shade off into each other in a border-land where no

arbitrary line can be drawn between them. Science studied in a truly

scientific spirit, following out its own deductions unflinchingly to

their legitimate conclusions, will always reveal the twofold aspect of

things, the inner and the outer; and it is only a truncated and maimed

science that refuses to recognise both.

The study of the material world is not Materialism, if it be allowed to

progress to its legitimate issue. Materialism is that limited view of

the universe which will not admit the existence of anything but

mechanical effects of mechanical causes, and a system which recognises

no higher power than the physical forces of nature must logically result

in having no higher ultimate appeal than to physical force or to fraud

as its alternative. I speak, of course, of the tendency of the system,

not of the morality of individuals, who are often very far in advance of

the systems they profess. But as we would avoid the propagation of a

mode of thought whose effects history shows only too plainly, whether in

the Italy of the Borgias, or the France of the First Revolution, or the

Commune of the Franco-Prussian War, we should set ourselves to study

that inner and spiritual aspect of things which is the basis of a system

whose logical results are truth and love instead of perfidy and

violence.

Some of us, doubtless, have often wondered why the Heavenly Jerusalem is

described in the Book of Revelations as a cube; "the length and the

breadth and the height of it are equal." This is because the cube is the

figure of perfect stability, and thus represents Truth, which can never

be overthrown. Turn it on what side you will, it still remains the

perfect cube, always standing upright; you cannot upset it. This figure,

then, represents the manifestation in concrete solidity of that central

life-giving energy, which is not itself any one plane but generates all

planes, the planes of the above and of the below and of all four sides.

But it is at the same time a city, a place of habitation; and this is

because that which is "the within" is Living Spirit, which has its

dwelling there.

As one plane of the cube implies all the other planes and also "the

within," so any plane of manifestation implies the others and also that

"within" which generates them all. Now, if we would make any progress in

the spiritual side of science--and _every_ department of science has its

spiritual side--we must always keep our minds fixed upon this "innermost

within" which contains the potential of all outward manifestation, the

"fourth dimension" which generates the cube; and our common forms of

speech show how intuitively we do this. We speak of the spirit in which

an act is done, of entering into the spirit of a game, of the spirit of

the time, and so on. Everywhere our intuition points out the spirit as

the true essence of things; and it is only when we commence arguing

about them from without, instead of from within, that our true

perception of their nature is lost.

The scientific study of spirit consists in following up intelligently

and according to definite method the same principle that now only

flashes upon us at intervals fitfully and vaguely. When we once realise

that this universal and unlimited power of spirit is at the root of all

things and of ourselves also, then we have obtained the key to the whole

position; and, however far we may carry our studies in spiritual

science, we shall nowhere find anything else but particular developments

of this one universal principle. "The Kingdom of Heaven is _within_

you."

I have laid stress on the fact that the "innermost within" of all things

is living Spirit, and that the Science of Spirit is distinguished from

the Science of Matter in that it contemplates Energy under an aspect of

responsive intelligence which does not fall within the scope of physical

science, as such. These are the two great points to lay hold of if we

would retain a clear idea of Spiritual Science, and not be misled by

arguments drawn from the physical side of Science only--the livingness

of the originating principle which is at the heart of all things, and

its intelligent and responsive nature. Its livingness is patent to our

observation, at any rate from the point where we recognise it in the

vegetable kingdom; but its intelligence and responsiveness are not,

perhaps, at once so obvious. Nevertheless, a little thought will soon

lead us to recognise this also.

No one can deny that there is an intelligent order throughout all

nature, for it requires the highest intelligence of our most

highly-trained minds to follow the steps of this universal intelligence

which is always in advance of them. The more deeply we investigate the

world we live in, the more clear it must become to us that all our

science is the translation into words or numerical symbols of that order

which already exists. If the clear statement of this existing order is

the highest that the human intellect can reach, this surely argues a

corresponding intelligence in the power which gives rise to this great

sequence of order and interrelation, so as to constitute one harmonious

whole. Now, unless we fall back on the idea of a workman working upon

material external to himself--in which case we have to explain the

phenomenon of the workman--the only conception we can form of this power

is that it is the Living Spirit inherent in the heart of every atom,

giving it outward form and definition, and becoming in it those

intrinsic polarities which constitute its characteristic nature.

There is no random work here. Every attraction and repulsion acts with

its proper force collecting the atoms into molecules, the molecules into

tissues, the tissues into organs, and the organs into individuals. At

each stage of the progress we get the sum of the intelligent forces

which operate in the constituent parts, _plus_ a higher degree of

intelligence which we may regard as the collective intelligence superior

to that of the mere sum-total of the parts, something which belongs to

the individual _as a whole_, and not to the parts as such. These are

facts which can be amply proved from physical science; and they also

supply a great law in spiritual science, which is that in any collective

body the intelligence of the whole is superior to that of the sum of the

parts.

Spirit is at the root of all things, and thoughtful observation shows

that its operation is guided by unfailing intelligence which adapts

means to ends, and harmonises the entire universe of manifested being in

those wonderful ways which physical science renders clearer every day;

and this intelligence must be in the generating spirit itself, because

there is no other source from which it could proceed. On these grounds,

therefore, we may distinctly affirm that Spirit is intelligent, and that

whatever it does is done by the intelligent adaptation of means to ends.

But Spirit is also responsive. And here we have to fall back upon the

law above stated, that the mere sum of the intelligence of Spirit in

lower degrees of manifestation is not equal to the intelligence of the

complex _whole_, as a whole. This is a radical law which we cannot

impress upon our minds too deeply. The degree of spiritual intelligence

is marked by the wholeness of the organism through which it finds

expression; and therefore the more highly organised being has a degree

of spirit which is superior to, and consequently capable of exercising

control over, all lower or less fully-integrated degrees of spirit; and

this being so, we can now begin to see why the spirit that is the

"innermost within" of all things is responsive as well as intelligent.

Being intelligent, it _knows_, and spirit being ultimately all there is,

that which it knows is itself. Hence it is that power which recognises

itself; and accordingly the lower powers of it recognise its higher

powers, and by the law of attraction they are bound to respond to the

higher degrees of themselves. On this general principle, therefore,

spirit, under whatever exterior revealed, is necessarily intelligent and

responsive. But intelligence and responsiveness imply personality; and

we may therefore now advance a step further and argue that _all_ spirit

contains the elements of personality, even though, in any particular

instance, it may not yet be expressed as that individual personality

which we find in ourselves.

In short, spirit is always personal in its nature, even when it has not

yet attained to that degree of synthesis which is sufficient to render

it personal in manifestation. In ourselves the synthesis has proceeded

far enough to reach that degree, and therefore we recognise ourselves as

the manifestation of personality. The human kingdom is the kingdom of

the manifestation of that personality, which is of the essence of

spiritual substance on every plane. Or, to put the whole argument in a

simpler form, we may say that our own personality must necessarily have

had its origin in that which is personal, on the principle that you

cannot get more out of a bag than it contains.

In ourselves, therefore, we find that more perfect synthesis of the

spirit into manifested personality which is wanting in the lower

kingdoms of nature, and, accordingly, since spirit is necessarily that

which knows itself and must, therefore, recognise its own degrees in its

various modes, the spirit in all degrees below that of human personality

is bound to respond to itself in that superior degree which constitutes

human individuality; and this is the basis of the power of human thought

to externalise itself in infinite forms of its own ordering.

But if the subordination of the lower degrees of spirit to the higher is

one of the fundamental laws which lie at the bottom of the creative

power of thought, there is another equally fundamental law which places

a salutary restraint upon the abuse of that power. It is the law that we

can command the powers of the universal for our own purposes only in

proportion as we first realise and obey their generic character. We can

employ water for any purpose which does not require it to run up-hill,

and we can utilise electricity for any purpose that does not require it

to pass from a lower to a higher potential.

So with that universal power which we call the Spirit. It has an

inherent generic character with which we must comply if we would employ

it for our specific purposes, and this character is summed up in the one

word "goodness." The Spirit is Life, hence its generic tendency must

always be lifeward or to the increase of the livingness of every

individual. And since it is universal it can have no particular

interests to serve, and therefore its action must always be equally for

the benefit of all. This is the generic character of spirit; and just as

water, or electricity, or any other of the physical forces of the

universe, will not work contrary to their generic character, so Spirit

will not work contrary to its generic character.

The inference is obvious. If we would use Spirit we must follow the law

of the Spirit which is "Goodness." This is the only limitation. If our

originating intention is good, we may employ the spiritual power for

what purpose we will. And how is "goodness" to be defined? Simply by the

child's definition that what is bad is not good, and that what is good

is not bad; we all know the difference between bad and good

instinctively. If we will conform to this principle of obedience to the

generic law of the Spirit, all that remains is for us to study the law

of the proportion which exists between the more and less fully

integrated modes of Spirit, and then bring our knowledge to bear with

determination.

The law of spirit, to which our investigation has now led us, is of the

very widest scope. We have followed it up from the conception of the

intelligence of spirit, subsisting in the initial atoms, to the

aggregation of this intelligence as the conscious identity of the

individual. But there is no reason why this law should cease to operate

at this point, or at any point short of the whole. The test of the

soundness of any principle is that it can operate as effectively on a

large scale as on a small one, that though the nature of its field is

determined by the nature of the principle itself, the extent of its

field is unlimited. If, therefore, we continue to follow up the law we

have been considering, it leads us to the conception of a unit of

intelligence as far superior to that of the individual man as the unity

of his individual intelligence is superior to that of the intelligence

of any single atom of his body; and thus we may conceive of a collective

individuality representing the spiritual character of any aggregate of

men, the inhabitants of a city, a district, a country, or of the entire

world.

Nor need the process stop here. On the same principle there would be a

superior collective individuality for the humanity of the entire solar

system, and finally we reach the conception of a supreme intelligence

bringing together in itself the collective individualities of all the

systems in the universe. This is by no means a merely fanciful notion.

We find it as the law by which our own conscious individuality is

constituted; and we find the analogous principle working universally on

the physical plane. It is known to physical science as the "law of

inverse squares," by which the forces of reciprocal attraction or

repulsion, as the case may be, are not merely equivalent to the sum of

the forces emitted by the two bodies concerned, but are equivalent to

these two forces multiplied together and divided by the square of the

distance between them, so that the resultant power continually rises in

a rapidly-increasing ratio as the two reciprocally exciting bodies

approach one another.

Since this law is so universal throughout physical nature, the doctrine

of continuity affords every ground for supposing that its analogue holds

good in respect of spiritual nature. We must never lose sight of the

old-world saying that "a truth on one plane is a truth on all." If a

principle exists at all it exists universally. We must not allow

ourselves to be misled by appearances; we must remember that the

perceptible results of the working of any principle consist of two

factors--the principle itself or the active factor, and the

subject-matter on which it acts or the passive factor; and that while

the former is invariable, the latter is variable, and that the operation

of the same invariable upon different variables must necessarily produce

a variety of results. This at once becomes evident if we state it

mathematically; for example, _a_, _b_ or _c_, multiplied by _x_ give

respectively the results _ax_, _bx_, _cx_, which differ materially from

one another, though the factor _x_ always remains the same.

This law of the generation of power by attraction applies on the

spiritual as well as on the physical plane, and acts with the same

mathematical precision on both; and thus the human individuality

consists, not in the mere aggregation of its parts, whether spiritual or

corporeal, but in the _unity_ of power resulting from the intimate

association into which those parts enter with one another, which unity,

according to this law of the generation of power by attraction, is

infinitely superior, both in intelligence and power, to any less fully

integrated mode of spirit. Thus a natural principle, common alike to

physical and spiritual law, fully accounts for all claims that have ever

been made for the creative power of our thought over all things that

come within the circle of our own particular life. Thus it is that each

man is the centre of his own universe, and has the power, by directing

his own thought, to control all things therein.

But, as I have said above, there is no reason why this principle should

not be recognised as expanding from the individual until it embraces

the entire universe. Each man, as the centre of his own world, is

himself centred in a higher system in which he is only one of

innumerable similar atoms, and this system again in a higher until we

reach the supreme centre of all things; intelligence and power increase

from centre to centre in a ratio rising with inconceivable rapidity,

according to the law we are now investigating, until they culminate in

illimitable intelligence and power commensurate with All-Being.

Now we have seen that the relation of man to the lower modes of spirit

is that of superiority and command, but what is his relation to these

higher modes? In any harmoniously constituted system the relation of the

part to the whole never interferes with the free operation of the part

in the performance of its own functions; but, on the contrary, it is

precisely by means of this relation that each part is maintained in a

position to discharge all functions for which it is fitted. Thus, then,

the subordination of the individual man to the supreme mind, so far from

curtailing his liberty, is the very condition which makes liberty

possible, or even life itself. The generic movement of the whole

necessarily carries the part along with it; and so long as the part

allows itself thus to be carried onwards there will be no hindrance to

its free working in any direction for which it is fitted by its own

individuality. This truth was set forth in the old Hindu religion as the

Car of Jaggarnath--an ideal car only, which later ages degraded into a

terribly material symbol. "Jaggarnath" means "Lord of the Universe," and

thus signifies the Universal Mind. This, by the law of Being, must

always move forward regardless of any attempts of individuals to

restrain it. Those who mount upon its car move onward with it to

endlessly advancing evolution, while those who seek to oppose it must be

crushed beneath its wheels, for it is no respecter of persons.

If, therefore, we would employ the universal law of spirit to control

our own little individual worlds, we must also recognise it in respect

to the supreme centre round which we ourselves revolve. But not in the

old way of supposing that this centre is a capricious Individuality

external to ourselves, which can be propitiated or cajoled into giving

the good which he is not good enough to give of his own proper motion.

So long as we retain this infantile idea we have not come into the

liberty which results from the knowledge of the certainty of Law.

Supreme Mind is Supreme Law, and can be calculated upon with the same

accuracy as when manifested in any of the particular laws of the

physical world; and the result of studying, understanding and obeying

this Supreme Law is that we thereby acquire the power to _use_ it. Nor

need we fear it with the old fear which comes from ignorance, for we can

rely with confidence upon the proposition that the whole can have no

interest adverse to the parts of which it is composed; and conversely

that the part can have no interest adverse to the whole.

Our ignorance of our relation to the whole may make us appear to have

separate interests, but a truer knowledge must always show such an idea

to be mistaken. For this reason, therefore, the same responsiveness of

spirit which manifests itself as obedience to our wishes, when we look

to those degrees of spirit which are lower than her own individuality,

must manifest itself as a necessary inflowing of intelligence and power

when we look to the infinity of spirit, of which our individuality is a

singular expression, because in so looking upwards we are looking for

the higher degrees of _ourself_.

The increased vitality of the parts means the increased vitality of the

whole, and since it is impossible to conceive of spirit otherwise than

as a continually expanding principle of Life, the demand for such

increased vitality must, by the inherent nature of spirit, be met by a

corresponding supply of continually growing intelligence and power.

Thus, by a natural law, the demand creates the supply, and this supply

may be freely applied to any and every subject-matter that commends

itself to us. There is no limit to the supply of this energy other than

what we ourselves put to it by our thought; nor is there any limit to

the purposes we may make it serve other than the one grand Law of Order,

which says that good things used for wrong purposes become evil. The

consideration of the intelligent and responsive nature of spirit shows

that there can be no limitations but these. The one is a limitation

inherent in spirit itself, and the other is a limitation which has no

root except in our own ignorance.

It is true that to maintain our healthy action within the circle of our

own individual world we must continually move forward with the movement

of the larger whole of which we form a part. But this does not imply any

restriction of our liberty to make the fullest use of our lives in

accordance with those universal principles of life upon which they are

founded; for there is not one law for the part and another for the

whole, but the same law of Being permeates both alike. In proportion,

therefore, as we realise the true law of our own individuality we shall

find that it is one with the law of progress for the race. The

collective individuality of mankind is only the reproduction on a larger

scale of the personal individuality; and whatever action truly develops

the inherent powers of the individual must necessarily be in line with

that forward march of the universal mind which is the evolution of

humanity as a whole.

Selfishness is a narrow view of our own nature which loses sight of our

place in relation to the whole, not perceiving that it is from this very

relation that our life is drawn. It is ignorance of our own

possibilities and consequent limitation of our own powers. If,

therefore, the evidence of harmonious correlation throughout the

physical world leads irresistibly to the inference of intelligent

spirit as the innermost within of all things, we must recognise

ourselves also as individual manifestations of the same spirit which

expresses itself throughout the universe as that power of intelligent

responsiveness which is Love.

Thus we find ourselves to be a necessary and integral part of the

Infinite Harmony of All-Being; not merely recognising this great truth

as a vague intuition, but as the logical and unavoidable result of the

universal Life-principle which permeates all Nature. We find our

intuition was true because we have discovered the law which gave rise to

it; and now intuition and investigation both unite in telling us of our

own individual place in the great scheme of things. Even the most

advanced among us have, as yet, little more than the faintest

adumbration of what this place is. It is the place of _power_. Towards

those higher modes of spirit which we speak of as "the universal," the

law of man's inmost nature makes him as a lens, drawing into the focus

of his own individuality all that he will of light and power in streams

of inexhaustible supply; and towards the lower modes of spirit, which

form for each one the sphere of his own particular world, man thus

becomes the directive centre of energy and order.

Can we conceive of any position containing greater possibilities than

these? The circle of this vital influence may expand as the individual

grows into the wider contemplation of his unity with Infinite Being; but

any more comprehensive law of relationship it would be impossible to

formulate. Emerson has rightly said that a little algebra will often do

far more towards clearing our ideas than a large amount of poetic

simile. Algebraically it is a self-evident proposition that any

difference between various powers of _x_ disappears when they are

compared with _x_ multiplied into itself to infinity, because there can

be no ratio between any determinate power, however high, and the

infinite; and thus the relation between the individual and All-Being

must always remain the same.

But this in no way interferes with the law of growth, by which the

individual rises to higher and higher powers of his own individuality.

The unchangeableness of the relation between all determinate powers of

_x_ and infinity does not affect the relations of the different powers

of _x_ between themselves; but rather the fact that the multiplication

of _x_ into itself to infinity is mentally conceivable is the very proof

that there is no limit to the extent to which it is possible to raise

_x_ in its determinate powers.

I trust unmathematical readers will pardon my using this method of

statement for the benefit of others to whom it will carry conviction. A

relation once clearly grasped in its mathematical aspect becomes

thenceforth one of the unalterable truths of the universe, no longer a

thing to be argued about, but an axiom which may be assumed as the

foundation on which to build up the edifice of further knowledge. But,

laying aside mathematical formulæ, we may say that because the Infinite

is infinite there can be no limit to the extent to which the vital

principle of growth may draw upon it, and therefore there is no limit to

the expansion of the individual's powers. Because we are _what_ we are,

we may _become_ what we will.

The Kabbalists tell us of "the lost word," the word of power which

mankind has lost. To him who discovers this word all things are

possible. Is this mirific word really lost? Yes, and No. It is the open

secret of the universe, and the Bible gives us the key to it. It tells

us, "The Word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth and in thy heart." It is

the most familiar of all words, the word which in our heart we realise

as the centre of our conscious being, and which is in our mouth a

hundred times a day. It is the word "I AM." Because I am what I am, I

may be what I will to be. My individuality is one of the modes in which

the Infinite expresses itself, and therefore I am myself that very power

which I find to be the innermost within of all things.

To me, thus realising the great unity of all Spirit, the infinite is not

the indefinite, for I see it to be the infinite of _Myself_. It is the

very same I AM that I am; and this not by any act of uncertain favour,

but by the law of polarity which is the basis of all Nature. The law of

polarity is that law according to which everything attains completion by

manifesting itself in the opposite direction to that from which it

started. It is the simple law by which there can be no inside without an

outside, nor one end of a stick without an opposite end.

Life is motion, and all motion is the appearance of energy at another

point, and, where any work has been done, under another form than that

in which it originated; but wherever it reappears, and in whatever new

form, the vivifying energy is still the same. This is nothing else than

the scientific doctrine of the conservation of energy, and it is upon

this well-recognised principle that our perception of ourselves as

integral portions of the great universal power is based.

We do well to pay heed to the sayings of the great teachers who have

taught that all power is in the "I AM," and to accept this teaching by

faith in their bare authority rather than not accept it at all; but the

more excellent way is to know _why_ they taught thus, and to realise for

ourselves this first great law which all the master-minds have realised

throughout the ages. It is indeed true that the "lost word" is the one

most familiar to us, ever in our hearts and on our lips. We have lost,

not the word, but the realisation of its power. And as the infinite

depths of meaning which the words I AM carry with them open out to us,

we begin to realise the stupendous truth that we are ourselves the very

power which we seek.

It is the polarisation of Spirit from the universal into the particular,

carrying with it all its inherent powers, just as the smallest flame has

all the qualities of fire. The I AM in the individual is none other than

the I AM in the universal. It is the same Power working in the smaller

sphere of which the individual is the centre. This is the great truth

which the ancients set forth under the figure of the Macrocosm and the

Microcosm, the lesser I AM reproducing the precise image of the greater,

and of which the Bible tells us when it speaks of man as the image of

God.

Now the immense practical importance of this principle is that it

affords the key to the great law that "as a man thinks so he is." We are

often asked why this should be, and the answer may be stated as follows:

We know by personal experience that we realise our own livingness in two

ways, by our power to act and our susceptibility to feel; and when we

consider Spirit in the absolute we can only conceive of it as these two

modes of livingness carried to infinity. This, therefore, means infinite

susceptibility. There can be no question as to the degree of

sensitiveness, for Spirit _is_ sensitiveness, and is thus infinitely

plastic to the slightest touch that is brought to bear upon it; and

hence every thought we formulate sends its vibrating currents out into

the infinite of Spirit, producing there currents of like quality but of

far vaster power.

But Spirit in the Infinite is the Creative Power of the universe, and

the impact of our thought upon it thus sets in motion a veritable

creative force. And if this law holds good of one thought it holds good

of all, and hence we are continually creating for ourselves a world of

surroundings which accurately reproduces the complexion of our own

thoughts. Persistent thoughts will naturally produce a greater external

effect than casual ones not centred upon any particular object.

Scattered thoughts which recognise no principle of unity will fail to

reproduce any principle of unity. The thought that we are weak and have

no power over circumstances results in inability to control

circumstances, and the thought of power produces power.

At every moment we are dealing with an infinitely sensitive medium which

stirs creative energies that give form to the slightest of our

thought-vibrations. This power is inherent in us because of our

spiritual nature, and we cannot divest ourselves of it. It is our truly

tremendous heritage because it is a power which, if not intelligently

brought into lines of orderly activity, will spend its uncontrolled

forces in devastating energy. If it is not used to build up, it will

destroy. And there is nothing exceptional in this: it is merely the

reappearance on the plane of the universal and undifferentiated of the

same principle that pervades all the forces of Nature. Which of these is

not destructive unless drawn off into some definite direction?

Accumulated steam, accumulated electricity, accumulated water, will at

length burst forth, carrying destruction all around; but, drawn off

through suitable channels, they become sources of constructive power,

inexhaustible as Nature itself.

And here let me pause to draw attention to this idea of accumulation.

The greater the accumulation of energy, the greater the danger if it be

not directed into a proper order, and the greater the power if it be.

Fortunately for mankind the physical forces, such as electricity, do not

usually subsist in a highly concentrated form. Occasionally

circumstances concur to produce such concentration, but as a rule the

elements of power are more or less equally dispersed. Similarly, for the

mass of mankind, this spiritual power has not yet reached a very high

degree of concentration. Every mind, it is true, must be in some measure

a centre of concentration, for otherwise it would have no conscious

individuality; but the power of the individualised mind rapidly rises as

it recognises its unity with the Infinite life, and its

thought-currents, whether well or ill directed, then assume a

proportionately great significance.

Hence the ill effects of wrongly directed thought are in some degree

mitigated in the great mass of mankind, and many causes are in operation

to give a right direction to their thoughts, though the thinkers

themselves are ignorant of what thought-power is. To give a right

direction to the thoughts of ignorant thinkers is the purpose of much

religious teaching, which these uninstructed ones must accept by faith

in bare authority because they are unable to realise its true import.

But notwithstanding the aids thus afforded to mankind, the general

stream of unregulated thought cannot but have an adverse tendency, and

hence the great object to which the instructed mind directs its power is

to free itself from the entanglements of disordered thought, and to help

others to do the same. To escape from this entanglement is to attain

perfect Liberty, which is perfect Power.

The entanglement from which we need to escape has its origin in the very

same principle which gives rise to liberty and power. It is the same

principle applied under inverted conditions. And here I would draw

particular attention to the law that any sequence followed out in an

inverted order must produce an inverted result, for this goes a long way

to explain many of the problems of life. The physical world affords

endless examples of the working of "inversion." In the dynamo the

sequence commences with mechanical force which is ultimately transformed

into the subtler power of electricity; but invert this order, commence

by generating electricity, and it becomes converted into mechanical

force, as in the motor. In the one order the rotation of a wheel

produces electricity, and in the opposite order electricity produces the

rotation of a wheel. Or to exhibit the same principle in the simplest

arithmetical form, if 10÷2=5 then 10÷5=2. "Inversion" is a factor of the

greatest magnitude and has to be reckoned with; but I must content

myself here with only indicating the general principle that the same

power is capable of producing diametrically opposite effects if it be

applied under opposite conditions, a truth which the so-called

"magicians" of the middle ages expressed by two triangles placed

inversely to one another. We are apt to fall into the mistake of

supposing that results of opposite character require powers of opposite

character to produce them, and our conceptions of things in general

become much simplified when we recognise that this is not the case, but

that the same power will produce opposite results as it starts from

opposite poles.

Accordingly the inverted application of the same principle which gives

rise to liberty and power constitutes the entanglement from which we

need to be delivered before power and liberty can be attained, and this

principle is expressed in the law that "as a man thinks so he is." This

is the basic law of the human mind. It is Descarte's "_cogito, ergo

sum_." If we trace consciousness to its seat we find that it is purely

subjective. Our external senses would cease to exist were it not for the

subjective consciousness which perceives what they communicate to it.

The idea conveyed to the subjective consciousness may be false, but

until some truer idea is more forcibly impressed in its stead it

remains a substantial reality to the mind which gives it objective

existence. I have seen a man speak to the stump of a tree which in the

moonlight looked like a person standing in a garden, and repeatedly ask

its name and what it wanted; and so far as the speaker's conception was

concerned the garden contained a living man who refused to answer. Thus

every mind lives in a world to which its own perceptions give objective

reality. Its perceptions may be erroneous, but they nevertheless

constitute the very reality of life for the mind that gives form to

them. No other life than the life we lead in our own mind is possible;

and hence the advance of the whole race depends on substituting the

ideas of good, of liberty, and of order for their opposites. And this

can be done only by giving some sufficient reason for accepting the new

idea in place of the old. For each one of us our beliefs constitute our

facts, and these beliefs can be changed only by discovering some ground

for a different belief.

This is briefly the rationale of the maxim that "as a man thinks so he

is"; and from the working of this principle all the issues of life

proceed. Now man's first perception of the law of cause and effect in

relation to his own conduct is that the result always partakes of the

quality of the cause; and since his argument is drawn from external

observation only, he regards external acts as the only causes he can

effectively set in operation. Hence when he attains sufficient moral

enlightenment to realise that many of his acts have been such as to

merit retribution he fears retribution as their proper result. Then by

reason of the law that "thoughts are things," the evils which he fears

take form and plunge him into adverse circumstances, which again prompt

him into further wrong acts, and from these come a fresh crop of fears

which in their turn become externalised into fresh evils, and thus

arises a circulus from which there is no escape so long as the man

recognises nothing but his external acts as a causative power in the

world of his surroundings.

This is the Law of Works, the Circle of Karma, the Wheel of Fate, from

which there appears to be no escape, because the complete fulfilment of

the law of our moral nature to-day is only sufficient for to-day and

leaves no surplus to compensate the failure of yesterday. This is the

necessary law of things as they appear from external observation only;

and, so long as this conception remains, the law of each man's

subjective consciousness makes it a reality for him. What is needed,

therefore, is to establish the conception that external acts are NOT the

only causative power, but that there is another law of causation,

namely, that of pure Thought. This is the Law of Faith, the Law of

Liberty; for it introduces us to a power which is able to inaugurate a

new sequence of causation not related to any past actions.

But this change of mental attitude cannot be brought about till we have

laid hold of some fact which is sufficient to afford a reason for the

change. We require some solid ground for our belief in this higher law.

Ultimately we find this ground in the great Truth of the eternal

relation between spirit in the universal and in the particular. When we

realise that substantially there is nothing else _but_ spirit, and that

we ourselves are reproductions in individuality of the Intelligence and

Love which rule the universe, we have reached the firm standing ground

where we find that we can send forth our Thought to produce any effect

we will. We have passed beyond the idea of two opposites requiring

reconciliation, into that of a duality in which there is no other

opposition than that of the inner and the outer of the same unity, the

polarity which is inherent in all Being, and we then realise that in

virtue of this unity our Thought is possessed of illimitable creative

power, and that it is free to range where it will, and is by no means

bound down to accept as inevitable the consequences which, if unchecked

by renovated thought, would flow from our past actions.

In its own independent creative power the mind has found the way out of

the fatal circle in which its previous ignorance of the highest law had

imprisoned it. The Unity of the Spirit is found to result in perfect

Liberty; the old sequence of Karma has been cut off, and a new and

higher order has been introduced. In the old order the line of thought

received its quality from the quality of the actions, and since they

always fell short of perfection, the development of a higher

thought-power from this root was impossible. This is the order in which

everything is seen from _without_. It is an inverted order. But in the

true order everything is seen from _within_.

It is the thought which determines the quality of the action, and not

_vice versa_, and since thought is free, it is at liberty to direct

itself to the highest principles, which thus spontaneously reproduce

themselves in the outward acts, so that both thoughts and actions are

brought into harmony with the great eternal laws and become one in

purpose with the Universal Mind. The man realises that he is no longer

bound by the consequences of his former deeds, done in the time of his

ignorance, in fact, that he never was bound by them except so far as he

himself gave them this power by false conceptions of the truth; and thus

recognising himself for what he really is--the expression of the

Infinite Spirit in individual personality--he finds that he is free,

that he is a "partaker of Divine nature," not losing his identity, but

becoming more and more fully himself with an ever-expanding perfection,

following out a line of evolution whose possibilities are inexhaustible.

But there is not in all men this knowledge. For the most part they still

look upon God as an individual Being external to themselves, and what

the more instructed man sees to be unity of mind and identity of nature

appear to the less advanced to be an external reconciliation between

opposing personalities. Hence the whole range of conceptions which may

be described as the Messianic Idea. This idea is not, as some seem to

suppose, a misconception of the truth of Being. On the contrary, when

rightly understood it will be found to imply the very widest grasp of

that truth; and it is from the platform of this supreme knowledge alone

that an idea so comprehensive in its adaptation to every class of mind

could have been evolved. It is the translation of the relations arising

from the deepest laws of Being into terms which can be realised even by

the most unlearned; a translation arranged with such consummate skill

that, as the mind grows in spirituality, every stage of advance is met

by a corresponding unfolding of the Divine meaning; while yet even the

crudest apprehension of the idea implied is sufficient to afford the

required basis for an entire renovation of the man's thoughts concerning

himself, giving him a standing ground from which to think of himself as

no longer bound by the law of retribution for past offences, but as free

to follow out the new law of Liberty as a child of God.

The man's conception of the _modus operandi_ of this emancipation may

take the form of the grossest anthropomorphism or the most childish

notions as to the satisfaction of the Divine justice by vicarious

substitution, but the working result will be the same. He has got what

satisfies him as a ground for thinking of himself in a perfectly new

light; and since the states of our subjective consciousness constitute

the realities of our life, to afford him a convincing ground for

_thinking_ himself free, is to make him free.

With increasing light he may find that his first explanation of the

_modus operandi_ was inadequate; but when he reaches this stage, further

investigation will show him that the great truth of his liberty rests

upon a firmer foundation than the conventional interpretation of

traditional dogmas, and that it has its roots in the great law of

Nature, which are never doubtful, and which can never be overturned. And

it is precisely because their whole action has its root in the

unchangeable laws of Mind that there exists a perpetual necessity for

presenting to men something which they can lay hold of as a sufficient

ground for that change of mental attitude, by which alone they can be

rescued from the fatal circle which is figured under the symbol of the

Old Serpent.

The hope and adumbration of such a new principle has formed the

substance of all religions in all ages, however misapprehended by the

ignorant worshippers; and, whatever our individual opinions may be as to

the historical facts of Christianity, we shall find that the great

figure of liberated and perfected humanity which forms its centre

fulfils this desire of all nations in that it sets forth their great

ideal of Divine power intervening to rescue man by becoming one with

him. This is the conception presented to us, whether we apprehend it in

the most literally material sense, or as the ideal presentation of the

deepest philosophic study of mental laws, or in whatever variety of ways

we may combine these two extremes. The ultimate idea impressed upon the

mind must always be the same: it is that there is a Divine warrant for

knowing ourselves to be the children of God and "partakers of the Divine

nature"; and when we thus realise that there is solid ground for

_believing_ ourselves free, by force of this very belief we _become_

free.

The proper outcome of the study of the laws of spirit which constitute

the inner side of things is not the gratification of a mere idle

curiosity, nor the acquisition of abnormal powers, but the attainment of

our spiritual liberty, without which no further progress is possible.

When we have reached this goal the old things have passed away and all

things have become new. The mystical seven days of the old creation have

been fulfilled, and the first day of the new week dawns upon us with its

resurrection to a new life, expressing on the highest plane that great

doctrine of the "octave" which the science of the ancient temples traced

through Nature, and which the science of the present day endorses,

though ignorant of its supreme significance.

When we have thus been made free by recognising our oneness with

Infinite Being, we have reached the termination of the old series of

sequences and have gained the starting-point of the new. The old

limitations are found never to have had any existence save in our own

misapprehension of the truth, and one by one they fall off as we advance

into clearer light. We find that the Life-Spirit we seek is _in

ourselves_; and, having this for our centre, our relation to all else

becomes part of a wondrous living Order in which every part works in

sympathy with the whole, and the whole in sympathy with every part, a

harmony wide as infinitude, and in which there are no limitations save

those imposed by the Law of Love.

I have endeavoured in this short series of articles to sketch briefly

the principal points of relation between Spirit in ourselves and in our

surroundings. This subject has employed the intelligence of mankind from

grey antiquity to the present day, and no one thinker can ever hope to

grasp it in all its amplitude. But there are certain broad principles

which we must all grasp, however we may specialise our studies in

detail, and these I have sought to indicate, with what degree of success

the reader must form his own opinion. Let him, however, lay firm hold of

this one fundamental truth, and the evolution of further truth from it

is only a question of time--that there is only One Spirit, however many

the modes of its manifestations, and that "the Unity of the Spirit is

the Bond of Peace."