Part Fifteen
Experiments with parasites found on plants indicate that even
the lowest order of life is enabled to take advantage of natural
law. This experiment was made by Jacques Loch, M.D., Ph. D., a
member of the Rockefeller Institute.
"In order to obtain the material, potted rose bushes are brought
into a room and placed in front of a closed window. If the plants
are allowed to dry out, the aphids (parasites), previously wingless,
change to winged insects. After the metamorphosis, the animals leave
the plants, fly to the window and then creep upward on the glass."
It is evident that these tiny insects found that the plants on
which they had been thriving were dead, and that they could
therefore secure nothing more to eat and drink from this source. The
only method by which they could save themselves from starvation was
to grow temporary wings and fly, which they did.
Experiments such as these indicate that Omniscience as well as
Omnipotence is omnipresent and that the tiniest living thing can
take advantage of it in an emergency.
Part Fifteen will tell you more about the law under which we
live. It will explain that these laws operate to our advantage; that
all conditions and experiences that come to us are for our benefit;
that we gain strength in proportion to the effort expended, and that
our happiness is best attained through a conscious cooperation with
natural laws.
PART FIFTEEN
1. The laws under which we live are designed solely for our
advantage. These laws are immutable and we cannot escape from their
operation.
2. All the great eternal forces act in solemn silence, but it is
in our power to place ourselves in harmony with them and thus
express a life of comparative peace and happiness.
3. Difficulties, inharmonies, and obstacles, indicate that we are
either refusing to give out what we no longer need, or refusing to
accept what we require.
4. Growth is attained through an exchange of the old for the new,
of the good for the better; it is a conditional or reciprocal
action, for each of us is a complete thought entity and this
completeness makes it possible for us to receive only as we give.
5. We cannot obtain what we lack if we tenaciously cling to what
we have. We are able to consciously control our conditions as we
come to sense the purpose of what we attract, and are able to
extract from each experience only what we require for our further
growth. Our ability to do this determines the degree of harmony or
happiness we attain.
6. The ability to appropriate what we require for our growth,
continually increases as we reach higher planes and broader visions,
and the greater our abilities to know what we require, the more
certain we shall be to discern its presence, to attract it and to
absorb it. Nothing may reach us except what is necessary for our
growth.
7. All conditions and experiences that come to us do so for our
benefit. Difficulties and obstacles will continue to come until we
absorb their wisdom and gather from them the essentials of further
growth.
8. That we reap what we sow is mathematically exact. We gain
permanent strength exactly to the extent of the effort required to
overcome difficulties.
9. The inexorable requirements of growth demand that we exert the
greatest degree of attraction for what is perfectly in accord with
us. Our highest happiness will be best attained through our
understanding of, and conscious cooperation with natural laws.
10. In order to possess vitality thought must be impregnated with
love. Love is a product of the emotions. It is therefore essential
that the emotions be controlled and guided by the intellect and
reason.
11. It is love which imparts vitality to thought and thus enables
it to germinate. The law of attraction, or the law of love, for they
are one and the same, will bring to it the necessary material for
its growth and maturity.
12. The first form which thought will find is language, or words;
this determines the importance of words; they are the first
manifestation of thought -- the vessels in which thought is carried.
They take hold of the ether and by setting it in motion reproduce
the thought to others in the form of sound.
13. Thought may lead to action of any kind, but whatever the
action, it is simply the thought attempting to express itself in
visible form. It is evident, therefore, that if we wish desirable
conditions, we can afford to entertain only desirable thoughts.
14. This leads to the inevitable conclusion that if we wish to
express abundance in our lives, we can afford to think abundance
only, and as words are only thoughts taking form, we must be
especially careful to use nothing but constructive and harmonious
language, which when finally crystallized into objective forms, will
prove to our advantage.
15. We cannot escape from the pictures we incessantly photograph
on the mind, and this photography of erroneous conceptions is
exactly what is being done by the use of words, when we use any form
of language which is not identified with our welfare.
16. We manifest more and more life as our thought becomes
clarified and takes higher planes. This is obtained with greater
facility as we use word pictures that are clearly defined, and
relieved of the conceptions attached to them on lower planes of
thought.
17. It is with words that we must express our thoughts, and if we
are to make use of higher forms of truth, we may use only such
material as has been carefully and intelligently selected with this
purpose in view.
18. This wonderful power of clothing thoughts in the form of
words is what differentiates man from the rest of the animal
kingdom; by the use of the written word he has been enabled to look
back over the centuries and see the stirring scenes by which he has
come into his present inheritance.
19. He has been enabled to come into communion with the greatest
writers and thinkers of all time, and the combined record which we
possess today is therefore the expression of Universal Thought as it
has been seeking to take form in the mind of Man.
20. We know that the Universal Thought has for its goal the
creation of form, and we know that the individual thought is
likewise forever attempting to express itself in form, and we know
that the word is a thought form, and a sentence is a combination of
thought forms, therefore, if we wish our ideal to be beautiful or
strong, we must see that the words out of which this temple will
eventually be created are exact, that they are put together
carefully, because accuracy in building words and sentences is the
highest form of architecture in civilization and is a passport to
success.
21. Words are thoughts and are therefore an invisible and
invincible power which will finally objectify themselves in the form
they are given.
22. Words may become mental places that will live forever, or
they may become shacks which the first breeze will carry away. They
may delight the eye as well as the ear; they may contain all
knowledge; in them we find the history of the past as well as the
hope of the future; they are living messengers from which every
human and superhuman activity is born.
23. The beauty of the word consists in the beauty of the thought;
the power of the word consists in the power of the thought, and the
power of the thought consists in its vitality. How shall we identify
a vital thought? What are its distinguishing characteristics? It
must have principle. How shall we identify principle?
24. There is a principle of Mathematics, but none of error; there
is a principle of health, but none of disease; there is a principle
of truth, but none of dishonesty; there is a principle of light, but
none of darkness, and there is a principle of abundance, but none of
poverty.
25. How shall we know that this is true? Because if we apply the
principle of Mathematics correctly we shall be certain of our
results. Where there is health there will be no disease. If we know
the Truth we cannot be deceived by error. If we let in light there
can be no darkness, and where there is abundance there can be no
poverty.
26. These are self-evident facts, but the all-important truth
that a thought containing principle is vital and therefore contains
life and consequently takes root, and eventually but surely and
certainly displaces the negative thoughts, which by their very
nature can contain no vitality, is one which seems to have been
overlooked.
27. But this is a fact which will enable you to destroy every
manner of discord, lack and limitation.
28. There can be no question but that he who "is wise enough to
understand" will readily recognize that the creative power of
thought places an invincible weapon in his hands and makes him a
master of destiny.
29. In the physical world there is a law of compensation which is
that "the appearance of a given amount of energy anywhere means the
disappearance of the same amount somewhere else," and so we find
that we can get only what we give; if we pledge ourselves to a
certain action we must be prepared to assume the responsibility for
the development of that action. The subconscious cannot reason. It
takes us at our word; we have asked for something; we are now to
receive it; we have made our bed, we are now to lie in it; the die
has been cast; the threads will carry out the pattern we have made.
30. For this reason Insight must be exercised so that the thought
which we entertain contains no mental, moral or physical germ which
we do not wish objectified in our lives.
31. Insight is a faculty of the mind whereby we are enabled to
examine facts and conditions at long range, a kind of human
telescope; it enables us to understand the difficulties, as well as
the possibilities, in any undertaking.
32. Insight enables us to be prepared for the obstacles which we
shall meet; we can therefore overcome them before they have any
opportunity of causing difficulty.
33. Insight enables us to plan to advantage and turn our thought
and attention in the right direction, instead of into channels which
can yield no possible return.
34. Insight is therefore absolutely essential for the development
of any great achievement, but with it we may enter, explore and
possess any mental field.
35. Insight is a product of the world within and is developed in
the Silence, by concentration.
36. For your exercise this week, concentrate on Insight; take
your accustomed position and focus the thought on the fact that to
have a knowledge of the creative power of thought does not mean to
possess the art of thinking. Let the thought dwell on the fact that
knowledge does not apply itself. That our actions are not governed
by knowledge, but by custom, precedent and habit. That the only way
we can get ourselves to apply knowledge is by a determined conscious
effort. Call to mind the fact that knowledge unused passes from the
mind, that the value of the information is in the application of the
principle; continue this line of thought until you gain sufficient
insight to formulate a definite program for applying this principle
to your own particular problem.
Think truly, and thy thoughts Shall the world's
famine feed; Speak truly, and each word of thine Shall be a fruitful
seed; Live truly, and thy life shall be A great and noble creed.
Horatio Bonar |