Power and Use of Thought
by
C.W.
Leadbeater
The Theosophical Publishing House
Adyar, Chennai 600 020 India
Wheaton, III.,USA London,
England
The Theosophical Publishing House, 1911
1.
THOSE who are ignorant of Theosophy sometimes suppose it to be merely a
system of speculative philosophy. Nothing could be farther from the truth than
this; there is nothing in any way speculative about it, for it is founded
entirely upon observation of facts, and upon experiments made in connection with
the phenomena and the forces of Nature. From its study emerges a practical rule
of life—a rule which cannot but affect the thought and action of its students at
every moment of their existence. This is chiefly because it involves a study of
life as it really is, so that its students become acquainted with the whole of
the world in which they live instead of knowing only the least important part of
it. They are led to understand the laws of evolution; and they naturally learn
to live intelligently in accordance with those laws and to take into account the
unseen part of the world as well as the infinitesimal portion which is within
reach of the limited physical senses.
2.
Of the general nature of the unseen world I have written elsewhere. For
the moment, let us concentrate our attention on one of its most striking
characteristics—the ready response of the finer types of matter (of which it is
constructed) to the influences of human thought and emotion. It is difficult for
those who have not studied the subject to grasp the absolute reality of the
forces—to understand that they are in every respect as definite in their action
upon the finer type of matter as is the power of stream or electricity upon
physical matter. Everyone knows that a man who has at his disposal a large
amount of steam power or electrical power can do useful work and produce
definite results; but few people know that every man has at his disposal a
certain amount of this other and higher power, and that with that he can produce
results just as definite and just as real. As matters stand at present in the
physical world, only a few men can have at their disposal any large amount of
its forces and so only a few can become rich by their means; but it is a
prominent feature of the vivid interest in the unseen side of life that every
human being, rich or poor, old or young, has already at his disposal no
inconsiderable proportion of its forces. And therefore the riches of these
higher planes, which are obtained by the right use of these powers, are within
the reach of all.
3.
Here, then, is a power possessed by all, but intelligently used as yet by
few, It is surely well worth our while to take up the matter, to enquire into
it, and to try to comprehend it. Indeed, there is even more reason for doing so
than has yet been mentioned, for the truth is that to some extent we are all
already unconsciously making use of this power and, because of our ignorance, we
are employing it wrongly and doing harm with it instead of good. The possession
of power always means responsibility; so in order to avoid doing harm
unintentionally, and in order to utilize thoroughly these magnificent
possibilities, it will clearly be well for us to learn all that we can on the
subject.
4.
What, then, is thought, and how does it show itself? Those who have even
a superficial acquaintance with theosophical literature are aware that man
possesses a vehicle corresponding to each of the interpenetrating worlds of our
solar system—that his astral body is the vehicle of his desires, passions, and
emotions; and that his thought expresses itself through that higher vehicle of
still finer matter which we usually call the mental body. It is in this latter
vehicle that thought first shows itself to the sight of the clairvoyant; and it
appears as a vibration of its matter—a vibration which is found to produce
various effects, all of them quite in line with what scientific experience in
the physical world would lead us to expect.
5.
First, there is the effect produced upon the mental body itself; and we
find that to be of the nature of setting up a habit. There are many different
types of matter in the mental body, and each of them appears to have its own
special rate of oscillation to which it seems most accustomed, so that it
readily responds to it and tends to return thereto as soon as possible when it
has been forced away from it by some strong rush of thought or feeling. A
sufficiently strong thought may, for the moment, set the whole of the matter of
the mental body swinging at the same rate; and every time that happens it is a
little easier for it to happen again. A habit of vibrating at that rate is being
set up in the mental body so that the man will readily repeat that particular
thought.
6.
Secondly, there is the effect produced upon the other vehicles of the man
which are above and below the mental body in degree of density. We know that in
the physical world disturbances in one type of matter are readily communicated
to another type—that, for example, an earthquake will produce a mighty wave in
the sea; and again (from the other side) that the disturbance of the air by a
storm will immediately produce ripples, and presently great waves, in the ocean
beneath it. In just the same way, a disturbance in a man’s astral body (that is
to say, what we commonly call an emotion) will set up undulations in the mental
body and cause thoughts which correspond to the emotion. Conversely, the
movement in the mental body affects the astral body, if it be of a type which
can affect it—which means that certain types of thought will readily provoke
emotion. Just as the mental vibration acts upon the astral matter, which is
denser than it is, so also does it inevitably act upon the matter of the causal
body which is finer than it. Thus the habitual thought of the man builds up
qualities in the ego himself.
7.
So far, we have been dealing with the effect of the man’s thought upon
himself; and we see that in the first place it tends to repeat itself, and that
in the second place it acts not only upon his emotions but also permanently upon
the man himself. Now let us turn to the effects which it produces outside of
himself—that is, upon the sea of mental matter which surrounds us all, just as
does the atmosphere.
8.
Thirdly, then, every thought produces a radiating undulation, which may
be either simple or complex according to the nature of the thought that gives it
birth. This vibration may, under certain conditions, be confined to the mental
world, but it may also produce an effect in worlds above and below. If the
thought be purely intellectual and impersonal—it, for example, the thinker is
considering a philosophical system or attempting to solve a problem in algebra
or geometry—the wave sent forth will affect merely the mental matter. If the
thought be of a spiritual nature—if it be tinged with love or aspiration, or
with deep unselfish feeling—it will rise upwards into the realm of the higher
mental, and may even borrow some of the splendour and glory of the intuitional
level—a combination which renders it exceedingly powerful. If, on the other
hand, the thought is tinged with something of self or of personal desire, its
oscillations at once draw downwards and expend most of their force in the astral
world.
9.
All these undulations act upon their respective levels just as does a
vibration of light or sound here in the physical world. They radiate out in all
directions, becoming less powerful in proportion to their distance from their
source. But we should remember that the radiations affect not only the sea of
mental matter which surrounds us, but other mental bodies moving within that
sea. We are all familiar with the experiment in which a note struck or a piano,
on a string sounded on a violin, will set the corresponding note sounding upon
another instrument of the same kind which has been tuned exactly to the same
pitch. Just as the vibration set up in one instrument is conveyed through the
air and acts upon the other instrument, so is the thought-vibration set up in
one mental body conveyed by the surrounding mental matter and reproduced in
another mental body—which, stated from another point of view, means that thought
is infectious. We shall return to this consideration later.
10.
Fourthly, every thought produces not only an undulation but a form—a
definite, separate object—which is endowed with force and vitality of a certain
kind and, in many cases, behaves like a temporary living creature. This form,
like the vibration, may be in the mental world only; but much more frequently it
descends to the astral level and produces its principal effect in the world of
emotions. The study of these thought-forms is of great interest; a detailed
account of many of them, with coloured illustrations of their appearance, will
be found in a book called Thought-Forms. * [The Theosophical Publishing
House]. At the moment, we are concerned less with their appearance than with
their effects and with the way in which they can be utilized.
11.
Let us consider separately the action of these two manifestations of
thought-power. The vibration may be simple or it may be complex, according to
the character of the thought ; but its strength is poured out chiefly upon some
one of the four levels of mental matter—the four subdivisions which constitute
the lower part of the mental world. Most of the thoughts of the ordinary man
centre round himself, his desires, and his emotions, and they are therefore
undulations of the lowest subdivision of mental matter; indeed, the
corresponding part of the mental body is the only one which is as yet fully
developed and active in the great majority of mankind. It must not be forgotten
that in this respect the condition of the mental body is very different from
that of the astral vehicle. In the ordinary cultured man of our race the astral
body is as fully developed as the physical, and he is perfectly capable of using
it as a vehicle of consciousness. But he is not yet much in the habit of so
using it, and is consequently shy about it and distrustful of his powers; but
the astral powers are all there, and it is simply a question of becoming
accustomed to their use. When he finds himself functioning in the astral world
either during sleep or after death, he is fully capable of sight and hearing and
can move about whithersoever he will.
12.
In the heaven-world, however, he finds himself under very different
conditions, for the mental body is as yet by no means fully developed, that
being the part of its evolution upon which the human race is at the present
moment engaged. The mental body can be employed as a vehicle only by those who
have been specially trained in its use under teachers belonging to the Great
Brotherhood of Initiates; in the average man it is only partially developed and
cannot in the least be employed as a separate vehicle of consciousness. In the
majority of men the higher portions of the mental body are as yet quite dormant,
even when the lower portions are in vigorous activity. This necessarily implies
that while the whole mental atmosphere is surging with vibrations belonging to
the lowest subdivision, there is as yet comparatively little activity on the
higher subdivisions—a fact which we shall need to have clearly in mind when we
come to consider presently the practical possibility of the use of
thought-power. It has also an important bearing upon the distance to which a
thought-wave can penetrate.
13.
The distance covered by such a wave and the strength and persistence with
which it can impinge upon the mental bodies of others, depend upon the strength
and clarity of the original thought. In this respect it resembles the voice of
the speaker, setting in motion waves of sound in the air which radiate from him
in all directions and convey his words to all those who are within hearing; and
the distance to which his voice can penetrate depends upon its strength and the
clearness of his enunciation. In exactly the same way, a strong thought will
carry much farther than one which is weak and undecided; but clearness and
distinctness are of even greater importance than strength. Again, just as the
speaker’s voice may fall upon heedless ears where men are already engaged in
business or in pleasure, so may a strong wave of thought sweep past without
affecting the mind of a man if he is already wholly engrossed in some other line
of thought. Many men, however, do not think definitely or strongly except when
in the immediate prosecution of some business that demands their whole
attention, so that there are always within reach many minds that are likely to
be considerably affected by the thoughts which impinge upon them.
14.
The action of this undulation is highly adaptable. It may exactly
reproduce itself, if it finds a mental body which readily responds to it in
every particular; but when this is not the case it may nevertheless produce a
decided effect along lines broadly similar to its own. Suppose for example, that
a Catholic kneels in devotion before an image of the Blessed Virgin. He sends
rippling out from him in all directions strong devotional vibrations; if they
strike upon the mental or astral body of another Catholic, they will arouse in
him a thought and feeling identical with the original. But if they should strike
upon a Christian of some other sect, to whom the image of the Blessed Virgin is
unfamiliar, they will still awaken in him the sentiment of devotion, but it will
follow along its accustomed channel and be directed, perhaps, towards the
Christ.
15.
In the same way, if they should touch a Muslim they would arouse in him
devotion to Allah, while in the case of a Hindu the object might be Krishna and
in the case of a Parsi, Ahuramazda. But they would excite devotion of some sort
wherever there was a possibility of response to that idea. If, however, they
should touch the mental body of a materialist, to whom the very idea of devotion
in any form is unknown, they would still produce an elevating effect. They could
not at once create a type of vibration to which the man was wholly unaccustomed,
but their tendency would be to stir a higher part of his mental body into some
sort of activity, and the effect, though less permanent than in the case of the
sympathetic recipient, could not fail to be good.
16.
The action of an evil or impure thought is governed by the same laws. A
man who is so foolish as to allow himself to think of another with hatred or
envy radiates a wave tending to provoke similar passions in others; and though
his feeling of hatred be for someone quite unknown to these others, so that it
is impossible for them to share it, yet the radiation will stir in then an
emotion of the same nature towards a totally different person.
17.
The work of the thought-form is more limited but much more precise than
that of the undulation. It cannot reach so many persons—indeed we may say that
it cannot act upon a person at all unless he has in him something which is
harmonious with the vibrant energy which ensouls it. The powers and
possibilities of these thought-forms will perhaps be clearer to us if we attempt
to classify them. Let us consider first the thought which is definitely directed
towards another person—as when a man sends forth from himself a thought of
affection or gratitude, envy or jealousy, towards someone else. Such a thought
will produce radiating waves precisely as would any other, and will therefore
tend to reproduce itself in the minds of those within the sphere of its
influence. But the thought-form which it creates is imbued with definite
intention and as soon as it breaks away from the mental and astral bodies of the
thinker it goes straight towards the person to whom it is directed and fastens
itself upon him.
18.
It may be compared not ineptly to a Leyden jar with its charge of
electricity—the matter of the mental and astral worlds forming the body
represented by the jar, and the vibrant energy of the thought which ensouls it
corresponding to the charge of electricity. If the man towards whom it is
directed is at that moment in a passive condition, or if he has within him
active oscillations of a character harmonious with its own, it will at once
discharge itself upon him. Its effect will naturally be to provoke an undulation
similar to its own if none such previously existed, and to intensify it if it is
already to be found there. If the man’s mind is for the time so strongly
occupied along some other lines that it is impossible for the vibration to find
an entrance, the thought-form hovers about him waiting for an opportunity to
discharge itself.
19.
In the case of a thought which is not directed to some other person but
is connected chiefly with the thinker himself (as indeed are the majority of
men’s thoughts) the undulation spreads in all directions as usual, but the
thought-form floats in the immediate neighbourhood of its creator, and its
tendency is constantly to react upon him. As long as his mind is fully occupied
with business or with a thought of some other type, the floating form simply
bides its time; but when his train of thought is exhausted, or his mind for a
moment lies fallow, it has an opportunity to react upon him, and immediately it
begins to repeat itself—to stir up in his mind a repetition of the thought to
which he had previously yielded himself. Many a man may be seen surrounded by a
shell of such thought-forms, and will frequently feel their pressure upon him—a
constant suggestion from without of certain thoughts; and if the thought be
evil, he very likely believes himself to be tempted by the devil, whereas the
truth is that he is his own tempter and that the evil thoughts are entirely his
own creation.
20.
Thirdly, there is the class of thought which is neither centred round the
thinker nor aimed specially at any person. The thought-form generated in this
case does not hang about the thinker, nor has it any special attraction towards
another man, so it simply remains idly floating where it was called into
existence. Each man as he moves through life is thus producing three classes of
thought-forms—those which shoot straight out away from him aiming at a definite
object; those which hover round him and follow him wherever he goes; and those
which he leaves behind him as a sort of trail which marks his route.
21.
The whole atmosphere is filled with thoughts of this third type, vague
and indeterminate; so that as we walk along we are, as it were, picking our way
through vast masses of them; and if our minds are not already definitely
occupied, these vague wandering fragments of other people’s thought will
seriously affect us. They sweep through the mind which is lying idle, and
probably the majority of them do not arouse in it any special interest; but now
and then comes one which attracts attention and the mind fastens upon it,
entertains it for a moment or two, and dismisses it a little stronger than it
was on arrival. Naturally this mixture of thought from many sources has no
definite coherence—though it must be remembered that any one of these may start
a line of associated ideas and so set the mind thinking on its own account. If a
man pulls himself up suddenly as he walks along the street and asks himself:
‘What am I thinking about, and why? How did I reach this particular point in my
train of thought?’ and if he tries to follow back the line of his thoughts for
the last ten minutes he will probably be quite surprised to discover how many
idle and useless thoughts have passed through his mind in that space of time.
They are not one fourth of them his own thoughts; they are simply those
fragments which he has picked up as he passed along. In most cases they are
quite valueless and their general tendency is distinctly more likely to be evil
than good.
22.
Now that we understand to some extent the action of thought, let us see
what use it is possible to make of this knowledge and what practical
considerations emerge from it. Knowing these things, what can we do to forward
our own evolution, and what can we do to help others? Obviously, a scientific
consideration of the way in which thought works exhibits it as a matter of far
greater importance for evolution than we ordinarily suppose. Since every thought
or emotion produces a permanent effect by strengthening or weakening a tendency
and since furthermore, every thought-vibration and thought-form must inevitably
react upon the thinker, the greatest care must be exercised as to the thought or
emotion which a man permits within himself. The ordinary man rarely thinks of
attempting to check an emotion; when he feels it surging within him he yields
himself to it and considers it merely natural. One who studies scientifically
the action of these forces realizes that it is in his interest as well as his
duty to check every such upwelling and consider, before he allows it to sway
him, whether it is or is not prejudicial to his evolution.
23.
Instead of allowing his emotions to run away with him, he must have them
absolutely under control; and since the state of evolution at which we have
arrived is the development of the mental body, he must take this matter also
seriously in hand and see what can be done to assist that development. Instead
of allowing the mind to indulge in its vagaries he should endeavour that the
mind is not the man, but is an instrument which the man must learn to use. It
must not be left to lie fallow; it must not be allowed to remain idle so that
any passing thought-form can drift in upon it and impress it. The worthy Isaac
Watts long ago remarked that ‘Satan finds some mischief still for idle hands to
do’, and certainly there is truth in the saying when it is applied to these
higher levels, for the mind which is left unoccupied is far more likely to take
up evil impressions than good ones. The first step towards control of the mind
is to learn to keep it usefully occupied—to have some definite good and useful
set of thoughts as a background to its operation—something upon which it can
always fall back when there is no immediate need for its activity in connection
with duty to be done.
24.
Another most necessary point in its training is that it should be taught
to do thoroughly that which it has to do—in other words, that the power of
concentration should be acquired. This is no light task, as any unpractised
person will find who endeavours to keep his mind absolutely upon one point even
for five minutes. He will find that there is an active tendency to wander, that
all kinds of other thoughts thrust themselves in. The first effort to fix the
mind on one subject for five minutes is likely to resolve itself into spending
five minutes in bringing the mind back again and again from various side-issues
which it has followed. Fortunately, though concentration itself is no easy
thing, there are plenty of opportunities for attempting it, and the acquisition
of it will be of great use in our daily life. We should learn then, whatever we
are doing, to focus our attention upon it, and to do it with all our might and
as well as it can be done. If we write a letter, let that letter be well and
accurately written, and let no carelessness in detail delay it or mar its
effect; if we are reading a book, even though it be only a novel, let us read it
with attention, trying to grasp the author’s meaning and to gain from it all
that there is to be gained. The endeavour to be constantly learning something,
to let no day pass without some definite exercise of the mind, is a most
salutary one; for it is only by exercise that strength comes, and disuse always
means weakness and eventual atrophy.
25.
Another point of great importance is that we should learn to husband our
energy. Each man possesses only a certain amount of energy and he is responsible
for using it to the best advantage. The ordinary man wastes his forces in the
most foolish manner; but it is especially necessary for the student of occultism
to learn to avoid this. The average man is simply a centre of agitated
vibrations; he is constantly in a state of worry, of trouble about something, or
of depression, or else he is unduly excited in the endeavour to grasp something.
For one reason or another he is always in a state of unnecessary agitation,
usually about the nearest trifle. Although he never thinks about it, he is all
the while influencing other people around him by this condition of his astral
and mental bodies; he is constantly communicating these vibrations and this
agitation to those unfortunate people who are near him. It is just because
millions of people are thus unnecessarily agitated by all sorts of foolish
desires and feelings that it is difficult for a sensitive person to live in a
large city or to go into a great crowd of his fellow men.
26.
Another way in which the average man wastes a great deal of force is by
unnecessary argument. It appears to be impossible for him to hold any opinion,
whether it be religious or political, or relating to some matter in ordinary
life, without becoming a prey to an overmastering desire to force this opinion
upon everyone else. He seems quite incapable of grasping the rudimentary fact
that what another man chooses to believe is no business of his, and that he is
not commissioned by the authorities in charge of the world to go round and
secure uniformity in thought and practice. The wise man realizes that truth is a
many-sided thing, not commonly held in its entirety by any one man or by any one
set of men; he knows that there is room for diversity of opinion upon almost any
conceivable subject, and that therefore a man whose point of view is opposite to
his own may nevertheless have something of reason and truth in his belief. He
knows that most of the subjects over which men argue are not in the least worth
the trouble of discussion, and that those who speak most loudly and most
confidently about them are usually those who know least. The student of
occultism will therefore decline to waste his time in argument; if he is asked
for information he is quite willing to give it, but not to waste his time and
strength in unprofitable wrangling.
27.
Another painfully common method of wasting strength is in worry. Many men
are constantly forecasting evil for themselves and for those whom they
love—troubling themselves with the fear of death and of what comes after it,
with the fear of financial ruin or loss of social position. A vast amount of
strength is frittered away along these unprofitable and unpleasant lines; but
all such foolishness is swept aside for the man who realizes that the world is
governed by a law of absolute justice, that progress towards the highest is the
divine Will for him, that he cannot escape from that progress, that whatever
comes in his way and whatever happens to him is meant to help him along that
line, and that he himself is the only person who can delay that advance. He no
longer fears for himself or others; he simply goes on and does the duty that
comes nearest in the best way that he can, confident that if he does this, all
will be well for him. He knows that worry never helped anyone, nor has it ever
been of the slightest use, but that it has been responsible for an immense
amount of evil and waste of force.
28.
The wise man declines to spend his strength in ill-directed emotion. For
example, he will utterly decline to take offence at what is said or done by
someone else. If another man says something which is untrue or offensive, it is
certain that in nine cases out of ten there was no evil intention behind the
remark, so that it is not only foolish but unjust to be disturbed about it. Even
in the rare case where the remark is intentionally wicked and spiteful—where the
man said something purposely to wound another—it is still utterly foolish for
that other to allow himself to feel hurt. The irritating word does not in any
way injure him, except in so far as he may choose to take it up and injure
himself by brooding over it or allowing himself to be wounded in his feelings.
What are the words of another, that he should let his serenity be disturbed by
them? If he permits himself to care about what another has said, then it is he
himself who is responsible for the disturbance created in his mental body and
not the other man. The other has done and can do nothing that can harm him, and
if the student feels hurt and injured, and thereby makes a great deal of trouble
for himself, he has only himself to thank for it. If he suffers a disturbance to
arise within his mental body or his astral body in reference to something that
another has said, that is merely because he has not yet perfect control over his
vehicles; he has not yet developed the common sense which enables him to look
down as a soul upon all this, and to go on his way and attend to his own work
without taking the slightest notice of foolish or spiteful remarks made by
others.
29.
But this is, after all, only one side of the matter, and that the least
important. It is certainly necessary for his own evolution that a man should
keep his mind and emotion under control and not foolishly waste his force; but
it is assuredly still more necessary from another point of view, because it is
only by such care that he can enable himself to be of use to his fellow men,
that he can avoid doing harm to them and can learn how to do good. If, for
example, he lets himself feel angry, he naturally produces a serious effect upon
himself because he sets up an evil habit and makes it more difficult to resist
the evil impulse next time it assails him. But he also acts seriously upon
others around him for, inevitably, the vibration which radiates from him must
affect them also. If he is making an effort to control his irritability, so
perhaps are they, and his action will help or hinder them, even though he is not
in the least thinking of them. Every time that he allows himself to send out a
wave of anger, it tends to arouse a similar vibration in the mind or astral body
of another—to arouse it if it has not previously existed, and to intensify it if
it is already present; and thus he makes his brother’s work of self-development
harder, and places a heavier burden upon his shoulders. On the other hand, if he
controls and represses that wave of anger, he radiates instead calming and
soothing influences which are distinctly helpful to all those near him who are
engaged in the same struggle.
30.
Inevitably and without any effort of ours, any thought which arises
within our minds must be influencing the minds of others about us. Consider then
the responsibility if a thought be impure or evil, for we are then spreading
moral contagion among our fellow men. Hundreds and thousands of people possess
within them latent germs of evil—germs which may never blossom and bear fruit
unless some force from without plays upon them and stirs them into activity. If
we yield ourselves to an impure or unholy thought, the wave of force which we
thus produce may be the very factor which awakens the germ and causes it to
begin to grow, and so we may start some soul upon a downward career. The impulse
so given may blossom out later into thoughts and words and deeds of evil, and
these in their turn may injuriously affect thousands of other men, even in the
far distant future. We see then how terrible is the responsibility for a single
impure or evil thought. Happily all this is true of good thought as well as of
evil, and the man who realizes this may set himself to work to be a veritable
sun, constantly radiating upon all his neighbours thoughts of love and calm and
peace. This is a truly magnificent power, yet it is within the reach of every
human being, of the poorest as well as the wealthiest, of the little child as
well as the great sage.
31.
Possessing this tremendous power, we must be careful how we exercise it.
We must remember to think of a person as we wish him to be, for the image that
we make of him will naturally act powerfully upon him and tend to draw him
gradually into harmony with itself. Let us fix our thoughts upon the good
qualities of our friends, because in thinking of any quality we tend to
strengthen its undulations and therefore to intensify it.
32.
From this consideration it follows that the habit of gossip and scandal,
in which many people thoughtlessly indulge themselves, is in reality a horrible
wickedness, in condemning which no expression can be too strong. When people are
guilty of the impertinence of discussing others, it is not usually upon the good
qualities that they most insist. We have, therefore, a number of people fixing
their thought upon some alleged evil in another, calling to that evil the
attention of others who might perhaps not have observed it; and in this way, if
that bad quality really exists in the person whom they are so improperly
criticizing, they distinctly increase it by strengthening the vibration which is
its expression. If, as is usually the case, the depravity exists only in their
own prurient imagination and is not present in the person about whom they are
gossiping, they are doing the utmost in their power to create that evil quality
in that person, and, if there be any latent germ of it existing in their victim,
their nefarious effort is only too likely to be successful.
33.
Assuredly we may think helpfully of those whom we love; we may hold
before them in thought a high ideal of themselves and wish strongly that they
may presently be enabled to attain it. If we know of certain defects or vices in
a man’s character we should never under any circumstances let our thoughts dwell
upon them and intensify them; on the contrary, we should formulate a strong
thought of the contrary virtues and send out waves of that thought to the man
who needs our help. The ordinary method is for one to say to another: ‘O, my
dear, what a terrible thing it is that Mrs So-and-so is so ill-tempered! Why, do
you know, only yesterday she did this and that, and I have heard that she
constantly, etc., etc. Isn’t it a terrible thing?
34.
And this is repeated by each of her thirty or forty dearest friends so
that in a few hours several hundred people are pouring converging streams of
thought, all about anger and irritability, upon the unfortunate victim. Is it
any wonder that she presently justifies their expectations and gives them yet
another example of ill-temper over which they can gloat?
35.
A man wishing to help in such a case will be especially careful to avoid
the idea of anger, but will think with all his force: ‘I wish Mrs So-and-so were
calm and serene; she has the possibility of such self-control within her; let me
try frequently to send her a strong, calm soothing influence that will help her
to realize the divine possibility within her.’ In the one case the thought is of
anger, and in the other it is of serenity; in both alike it will inevitably find
its goal and reproduce itself in the mental and astral bodies of the person of
whom the thought is made. By all means let us think frequently and lovingly of
our friends, but let us think of their good points and try, by concentrating our
attention upon those, to strengthen them and to help our friends by their means;
let our criticism be of that happy kind which grasps at a pearl as eagerly as
the criticism of the average man pounces upon an imaginary flaw.
36.
A man will often say that he cannot control his thought or his passion,
that he has often tried to do so but has constantly failed, and has therefore
come to the conclusion that such efforts are useless. This idea is wholly
unscientific. If an evil quality or habit possesses a certain amount of strength
within us, it is because in previous lives we have allowed that strength to
accumulate—because we have not resisted it in the beginning when it could easily
have been repressed, but have permitted it to gather the momentum which makes it
difficult now to deal with it.
37.
We have, in fact, made it very easy for ourselves to move along a certain
line, and correspondingly difficult to move along another line—difficult, but
not impossible. The amount of momentum or energy accumulated is necessarily a
finite amount; even if we have devoted several lives entirely to storing up such
energy (an unlikely supposition), still the time so occupied has been limited
and the results are necessarily finite. If we have now realized the mistake we
made, and are settling ourselves to control the habit and to counteract the
impetus, we shall find it necessary to put forth exactly as much strength in the
opposite direction as we originally spent in setting up that momentum.
Naturally, we cannot instantly produce sufficient force entirely to counteract
the work of many years, but every effort which we make will reduce the amount of
force stored up. We ourselves, as living souls, can go on generating force
indefinitely; we have an infinite store of strength on which to draw and
therefore it is absolutely certain that if we persevere we must eventually
succeed. However often we may fail, each time we succeed something is withdrawn
from that finite store of force and it will be exhausted before we shall; our
eventual success is simply a matter of mechanics.
38.
You may have seen a railway porter, by steady and continuous pushing, set
a big wagon or carriage in motion. Having brought it where he wishes, how does
he stop it? It is quite impossible for him, even by the exertion of his utmost
strength, to check it instantaneously; so he puts himself in front of it and
pushes vigorously against it, walking backwards as it forces him along, but
never ceasing to exert his force against its advance. Thus by degrees he
counterbalances the momentum which he has himself produced in it, and so at last
wins the victory and brings it to rest. A good object-lesson in the
neutralization of previous karma!
39.
The knowledge of the use of these thought-currents makes it possible for
us to give assistance when we know of some case of sorrow or suffering. It very
often happens that we are unable to do anything for the sufferer in the physical
world; our physical presence may not be helpful to him; his physical brain may
be closed to our suggestions by prejudice or by religious bigotry. But his
astral and mental bodies are far more easily impressible than the physical, and
it is always open to us to approach these by a wave of helpful thought or of
affection and soothing feeling.
40.
We must not forget that the law of cause and effect holds good just as
certainly in finer matter as in denser and that, consequently, the energy which
we pour forth must reach its goal and produce its effect. There can be no
question that the image or idea which we wish to put before a man for his
comfort or his help will reach him; whether it will present itself clearly to
his mind when it arrives, depends first upon the definiteness of outline which
we have been able to give to it and, secondly, upon his mental condition at the
time. He may be so fully occupied with thoughts of his own trials and sufferings
that there is little room for our idea to insert itself; but in that case our
thought-form simply bides its time and, when at last his attention is diverted
or exhaustion forces him to suspend the activity of his own train of thought,
will assuredly slip in and do its errand of mercy. There are so many cases where
the best will in the world can do nothing physically for a sufferer; but there
is no conceivable case in which, in either the mental or the astral world, some
relief cannot be given by steady, concentrated loving thought.
41.
The phenomena of mind-cure show how powerful thought may be even in the
physical world, and, since it acts so much more easily in astral and mental
matter, we may realize how tremendous the power really is, if we will but
exercise it. We should watch for an opportunity of being thus helpful; there is
little doubt that plenty of cases will offer themselves. As we walk along the
street, as we ride in a bus or a train we may often see someone who is obviously
suffering from depression or sadness; there is our opportunity, and we may
immediately take advantage of it by trying to arouse and to help him. Let us try
to send him strongly the feeling that, in spite of his personal sorrows and
troubles, the sun still shines above all and there is still much to be thankful
for, much that is good and beautiful in the world. Sometimes we may see the
instant effect of our effort—we may actually watch the man brighten up under the
influence of the thought which we have sent to him. We cannot always expect such
immediate physical results; but if we understand the laws of nature we shall in
every case be sure that some results is being produced.
42.
It is often difficult for the man who is unaccustomed to these studies to
believe that he is really affecting those at whom his thought is aimed; but
experience in a great number of cases has shown us that anyone who makes a
practice of such efforts will in time find evidence of his success accumulating
until it is no longer possible for him to doubt. Each man should make it part of
his life thus to try to help all whom he knows and loves, whether they be what
is commonly called living or what is commonly called dead; for naturally the
possession or the absence of the physical body makes no difference whatever to
the action of forces which are levelled at the mental and astral bodies. By
steady regular practice great good will be done, for we gain strength by using
it, and so while we are developing our own powers and ensuring our progress the
world will be helped by our kindly efforts.
43.
I remember seeing in an American book on mind-cure, a passage which
illustrates exceedingly well what should be the theosophical attitude to the
duties and associations of daily life: ‘Knead love into the bread you bake; wrap
strength and courage in the parcel which you tie for the woman with the weary
face; hand trust and candour with the coin that you pay to the man with the
suspicious eyes.’
44.
Quaint in expression, but lovely in its thought, truly the theosophical
concept that every connection is an opportunity, and that everyone whom we meet
even casually, is a person to be helped. Thus the student of the Good Law goes
through life distributing blessings on all about him, doing good unobtrusively
everywhere, though often the recipients of the blessing and the help may have no
idea whence it comes. Never forget that in such benefactions every man can take
his share, and every man ought to take his share; all who can think can send out
kindly, helpful thoughts, and no such thought has ever failed, or can ever fail
while the laws of the universe hold. We may not always see the result, but it is
there, and we know not what fruit may spring from the tiny seed which we sow in
passing along our path of peace and love.
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