… there is one safe general principle to be gained
from what has already been said about causes and conditions,
which
is that the whole sequence always partakes of the same character as the initial
cause: if that character is negative, that is, destitute of any desire to
externalize kindness, cheerfulness, strength, beauty or some other sort of
good, this negative quality will make itself felt all down the line; but if the
opposite affirmative character is in the original motive, then it will
reproduce its kind in forms of love, joy, strength and beauty with unerring
precision. Before setting out, therefore, to produce new conditions by the
exercise of our thought-power we should weigh carefully what further results
they are likely to lead to; and here, again, we shall find an ample field for
the training of our will, in learning to acquire that self-control which will
enable us to postpone an inferior present satisfaction to a greater prospective
good.
…
The other great principle to
be remembered is that concentration is for the purpose of determining the quality we are going to give to the
previously undifferentiated energy rather than to arrange the specific circumstances of its
manifestation. That is the work of the creative
energy itself, which will build up its own forms of expression quite naturally
if we allow it, thus saving us a great deal of needless anxiety.
What we really want is
expansion in a certain direction, whether of health, wealth, or what not: and
so long as we get this, what does it matter whether it reaches us through some
channel which we thought we could reckon upon or through some other whose
existence we had not suspected. It is the fact that we are concentrating energy
of a particular kind for a particular purpose that we should fix our minds
upon, and not look upon any specific details as essential to the accomplishment
of our object.
The Edinburgh Lectures on Mental Science, by Thomas Troward 1904
No comments:
Post a Comment