The possibilities of the life of all three natures are inexhaustible.
We have never touched the limit of even the physical man. Man at one
time had only his hands for tools, and so was limited in his powers.
But he used his mind to increase the power of his hands, and reached
out for sticks and stones to help him. In time his thought devised
implements that increased his physical power a thousandfold, until now
he has harnessed not only steam, but the very currents of the air, and
is making himself all-powerful.
He does not wholly understand the forces he tries to control, but he
studies them, experiments upon them, and makes servants of them as far
as he has grasped their laws. Had he insisted upon considering his mind
and his physical powers as entirely separate and refused to use them
together, he might still have claws for hands, and might still be a
mere burrower in the earth. Moreover, his mind would not have developed
as it has. Steam and electricity might have aroused his curiosity, but
he would not have known how to make them to do his will.
Further, if man had been able to keep his intellect apart from his
spirit, he would not have developed the qualities that lift him above
the more intelligent animals. Sympathy and justice and love would not
have come into his relations with his fellow-men.
These moral feelings expressed in our bodies, our minds, and our hearts
are some of the possibilities of the life of all three natures, and
to endeavor to know and harmonize them, thus “fitting one’s self for
one’s sphere,” would bring us the happiness that follows action and the
rest that flows from selfless purpose or harmony.
If we consider what the true object of life is, we cannot help trying
to see the connection between the three natures of man. It does not
seem possible that the life of any thinking being was intended to be a
purposeless jarring jumble, or, as poor Stephen Blackpool said, “a’ a
muddle.” We find such harmony in the life of the material world that
we may expect to find a similar harmony in the life of man. So soon as
we discover this, we see also that there must be harmony between the
life of the material world and the life of man, and further harmony
between both the material and the human life, and the Source of all
life. Seeing this, and living it, is fitting ourselves for our sphere,
preparing ourselves to take our destined places in the Universe as Men
and Women.
CHAPTER XLV
THE SPAN OF LIFE
We are such stuff as dreams are made on, and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep.
SHAKESPEARE.
Only a generation ago it was the custom for men and women to begin
to grow old at about forty-five. A person of fifty was always called
“old,” and a man was expected to be decrepit at sixty, a woman much
earlier. It is not wonderful that such men begrudged the time spent in
sleep.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account