The Edinburgh Lectures on Mental Science — John Shaqi
The Edinburgh Lectures on Mental ScienceTroward, T. (Thomas)
Religion
The Edinburgh Lectures on Mental Science
Troward, T. (Thomas)
New Thought
In this way, then, the recognition of the community of _personality_
between ourselves and the universal undifferentiated Spirit, which is the
root and substance of all things, solves the question of our release from
the iron grasp of an inflexible Law, not by abrogating the Law, which would
mean the annihilation of all things, but by producing in us an intelligence
equal in affinity with the universal Law itself, and thus enabling us to
apprehend and meet the requirements of the Law in each particular as it
arises. In this way the Cosmic Intelligence becomes individualized, and the
individual intelligence becomes universalized; the two became one, and in
proportion as this unity is realized and acted on, it will be found that
the Law, which gives rise to all outward conditions, whether of body or of
circumstances, becomes more and more clearly understood, and can therefore
be more freely made use of, so that by steady, intelligent endeavour to
unfold upon these lines we may reach degrees of power to which it is
impossible to assign any limits. The student who would understand the
rationale of the unfoldment of his own possibilities must make no mistake
here. He must realize that the whole process is that of bringing the
universal within the grasp of the individual by raising the individual to
the level of the universal and not vice-versa. It is a mathematical truism
that you cannot contract the infinite, and that you _can_ expand the
individual; and it is precisely on these lines that evolution works. The
laws of nature cannot be altered in the least degree; but we can come into
such a realization of our own relation to the universal principle of Law
that underlies them as to be able to press all particular laws, whether of
the visible or invisible side of Nature, into our service and so find
ourselves masters of the situation. This is to be accomplished by
knowledge; and the only knowledge which will effect this purpose in all its
measureless immensity is the knowledge of the personal element in Universal
Spirit in its reciprocity to our own personality. Our recognition of this
Spirit must therefore be twofold, as the principle of necessary sequence,
order or Law, and also as the principle of Intelligence, responsive to our
own recognition of it.
VIII.
RECIPROCAL ACTION OF THE UNIVERSAL AND INDIVIDUAL MINDS.
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