Then are students and teachers of these laws never ill, never run
down, "nervous," or prostrated? Yes, they are sometimes ill,
sometimes run down and overworked, and suffer the many evil effects
ensuing; but the work which has produced these results is much
greater and more laborious than would have been possible without the
practice of the principles. At the same time their states of illness
occur because they only partially obey the laws. In the degree which
they obey they will be preserved from the effects of tensity,
overstrung nerves, and generally worn-out bodies; and in sickness
coming from other causes--mechanical, hereditary, etc.--again,
according to their obedience, they will be held in all possible
physical and mental peace, so that the disease may wither and drop
like the decayed leaf of a plant.
As well might we ask of the wisest clergyman in the land, Do his
truths _never_ fail him? Is he _always_ held in harmony and nobility
by their power? However great and good the man may be, this state of
perfection will never be reached in this world.
In exact parallel to the spiritual laws upon which all universal
truth, of all religions, is founded, are the truths of this teaching
of physical peace and equilibrium. As religion applies to all the
needs of the soul, so this applies to all the needs of the body. As
a man may be continually progressing in nobility of thought and
action, and yet find himself under peculiar circumstances tried even
to the stumbling point,--so may the student of bodily quiet and
equilibrium, who appears even to a very careful observer to be in
surprising possession of his forces, under a similar test stumble
and fall into some form of the evil effects out of which he has had
power to lead others.
It is important that this parallelism should be recognized, that the
unity of these truths may be finally accomplished in the living;
therefore we repeat, Is this any more possible than that the full
control of the soul should be at once possessed?
Think of the marvellous construction of the human body,--the
exquisite adjustment of its economy. Could a power of control
sufficient to apply to its every detail be fully acquired at once,
or even in a life-time?
But when one does fall who has made himself even partially at one
with Nature's way of living, the power of patient waiting for relief
is very different. He separates himself from his ailments in a way
which without the preparation would be to him unknown. He has,
without drug or other external assistance, an anodyne always within
himself which he can use at pleasure. He positively experiences that
"underneath are the everlasting arms," and the power to experience
this gives him much respite from pain.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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