The practical and ethical result of this living unity of nature is the side which most attracted Law, and it is one which is as simple to state as it is difficult to apply. Boehme's philosophy is one which can only be apprehended by living it. Will, or desire, is the radical force in man as it is in nature and in the Godhead, and until that is turned towards the light, any purely historical or intellectual knowledge of these things is as useless as if hydrogen were to expect to become water by study of the qualities of oxygen, whereas what is needed is the actual union of the elements. The two most important of Law's mystical treatises are _An Appeal to all that Doubt_, 1740, and _The Way to Divine Knowledge_, 1752. The first of these should be read by any one desirous of knowing Law's later thought, for it is a clear and fine exposition of his attitude with regard more especially to the nature of man, the unity of all nature, and the quality of fire or desire. The later book is really an account of the main principles of Boehme, with a warning as to the right way to apply them, and it was written as an introduction to the new edition of Boehme's works which Law contemplated publishing. The following is the aspect of Boehme's teaching which Law most consistently emphasises. Man was made out of the Breath of God; his soul is a spark of the Deity. It therefore cannot die, for it "has the Unbeginning, Unending Life of God in it." Man has fallen from his high estate through ignorance and inexperience, through seeking separation, taking the part for the whole, desiring the knowledge of good and evil as separate things. The assertion of self is thus the root of all evil; for as soon as the will of man "turns to itself, and would, as it were, have a Sound of its own, it breaks off from the divine harmony, and falls into the misery of its own discord." For it is the state of our will that makes the state of our life. Hence, by the "fall," man's standpoint has been dislocated from centre to circumference, and he lives in a false imagination. Every quality is equally good, for there is nothing evil in God from whom all comes; but evil appears to be through separation. Thus strength and desire in the divine nature are necessary and magnificent qualities, but when, as in the creature, they are separated from love, they appear as evil.[34] The analogy of the fruit is, in this connection a favourite one with both Law and Boehme. When a fruit is unripe (i.e. incomplete) it is sour, bitter, astringent, unwholesome; but when it has been longer exposed to the sun and air it becomes sweet, luscious, and good to eat. Yet it is the same fruit, and the astringent qualities are not lost or destroyed, but transmuted and enriched, and are thus the main cause of its goodness.[35] The only way to pass from this condition of "bitterness" to ripeness, from this false imagination to the true one, is the way of death. We must die to what we are before we can be born