than casual ones not centred upon any particular object.
Scattered thoughts which recognise no principle of unity will fail to
reproduce any principle of unity. The thought that we are weak and have
no power over circumstances results in inability to control
circumstances, and the thought of power produces power.
At every moment we are dealing with an infinitely sensitive medium which
stirs creative energies that give form to the slightest of our
thought-vibrations. This power is inherent in us because of our
spiritual nature, and we cannot divest ourselves of it. It is our truly
tremendous heritage because it is a power which, if not intelligently
brought into lines of orderly activity, will spend its uncontrolled
forces in devastating energy. If it is not used to build up, it will
destroy. And there is nothing exceptional in this: it is merely the
reappearance on the plane of the universal and undifferentiated of the
same principle that pervades all the forces of Nature. Which of these is
not destructive unless drawn off into some definite direction?
Accumulated steam, accumulated electricity, accumulated water, will at
length burst forth, carrying destruction all around; but, drawn off
through suitable channels, they become sources of constructive power,
inexhaustible as Nature itself.
And here let me pause to draw attention to this idea of accumulation.
The greater the accumulation of energy, the greater the danger if it be
not directed into a proper order, and the greater the power if it be.
Fortunately for mankind the physical forces, such as electricity, do not
usually subsist in a highly concentrated form. Occasionally
circumstances concur to produce such concentration, but as a rule the
elements of power are more or less equally dispersed. Similarly, for the
mass of mankind, this spiritual power has not yet reached a very high
degree of concentration. Every mind, it is true, must be in some measure
a centre of concentration, for otherwise it would have no conscious
individuality; but the power of the individualised mind rapidly rises as
it recognises its unity with the Infinite life, and its
thought-currents, whether well or ill directed, then assume a
proportionately great significance.
Hence the ill effects of wrongly directed thought are in some degree
mitigated in the great mass of mankind, and many causes are in operation
to give a right direction to their thoughts, though the thinkers
themselves are ignorant of what thought-power is. To give a right
direction to the thoughts of ignorant thinkers is the purpose of much
religious teaching, which these uninstructed ones must accept by faith
in bare authority because they are unable to realise its true import.
But notwithstanding the aids thus afforded to mankind, the general
stream of unregulated thought cannot but have an adverse tendency, and
hence the great object to which the instructed mind directs its power is
to free itself from the entanglements of disordered thought, and to help
others to do the same. To escape from this entanglement is to attain
perfect Liberty, which is perfect Power.
The entanglement from which we need to escape has its origin in the very
same principle which gives rise to liberty and power. It is the same
principle applied under inverted conditions. And here I would draw
particular attention to the law that any sequence followed out in an
inverted order must produce an inverted result, for this goes a long way
to explain many of the problems of life. The physical world affords
endless examples of the working of "inversion." In the dynamo the
sequence commences with mechanical force which is ultimately transformed
into the subtler power of electricity; but invert this order, commence
by generating electricity, and it becomes converted into mechanical
force, as in the motor. In the one order the rotation of a wheel
produces electricity, and in the opposite order electricity produces the
rotation of a wheel. Or to exhibit the same principle in the simplest
arithmetical form, if 10÷2=5 then 10÷5=2. "Inversion" is a factor of the
greatest magnitude and has to be reckoned with; but I must content
myself here with only indicating the general principle that the same
power is capable of producing diametrically opposite effects if it be
applied under opposite conditions, a truth which the so-called
"magicians" of the middle ages expressed by two triangles placed
inversely to one another. We are apt to fall into the mistake of
supposing that results of opposite character require powers of opposite
character to produce them, and our conceptions of things in general
become much simplified when we recognise that this is not the case, but
that the same power will produce opposite results as it starts from
opposite poles.
Accordingly the inverted application
