The things that are really for thee gravitate to thee.—Emerson
NEW YORK
ROGER BROTHERS, Publishers
1909
London: L. N. FOWLER & COMPANY
TO THOSE
WHO ARE EARNESTLY SEEKING THEIR OWN I DEDICATE THIS BOOK
How to Obtain Our Own
SECTION I
Serene I fold my hands and wait,
Nor care for wind, nor tide, nor sea;
I rave no more ‘gainst time or fate,
For lo! my own shall come to me.
I stay my haste, I make delays,
For what avails this eager pace?
I stand amid the eternal ways,
And what is mine shall know my face.
Asleep, awake, by night or day,
The friends I seek are seeking me;
No wind can drive my bark astray,
Nor change the tide of destiny.
What matter if I stand alone?
I wait with joy the coming years;
My heart shall reap where it hath sown,
And garner up its fruit of tears.
The waters know their own, and draw
The brook that springs in yonder heights;
So flows the good with equal law
Unto the soul of pure delights.
The stars come nightly to the sky;
The tidal wave unto the sea;
Nor time, nor space, nor deep, nor high,
Can keep my own away from me.
—John Burroughs.
HOW TO OBTAIN OUR OWN
SECTION I
John Burroughs has expressed that certainty, that knowledge which comes to the awakened soul, to the effect that there is a sure supply for all its needs—a fulfillment of its every requirement—a coming true of its every earnest dream—a realization of its every high ideal. He teaches that every hope is the forerunner of its own fulfillment—that every aspiration is the first faint ray of the rising sun of its attainment. He teaches that in the hunger of the soul there is contained a certainty of the existence of the means wherewith that hunger may be satisfied; and that in the hunger itself is to be recognized the motive power that will urge on the soul to attainment, and will draw to it its means of sustenance.
—Ralph B. Dysart.
What is “Our Own”? “Our Own” is just what we create for ourselves. There is nothing higher for us than the things we know, but there are always increasing grades of knowing.
—Julia Seton Sears, M.D.
In the degree that the God life, with its attendant wisdom and power, dwells in us through our opening the way, in that degree do our latent possibilities change to actualized power. In other words, we determine our own limitations. In the degree that we come into the knowledge of our real selves our limitations rise and we come thereby into actual possession of our own.
—Ralph Waldo Trine.
The cause of whatever comes to you in life is within you. There is where it is created. The thing you long for and work for comes to you because your thought has created it; because there is something inside you that attracts it. It comes because there is an affinity within you for it. Your own comes to you; is always seeking you.
—Orison Swett Marden.
Thoughts not only “let us into realities,” but they are realities. They are the only realities— the only forces that create permanent results.
—Lilian Whiting.
It is not circumstances that make us, but we make circumstances. Complaint plants seeds of failure, confidence plants seeds of success. Both will flower and bring forth their own kind.
—Katharine H. Newcomb.
The only way to grow faster is not by straining, but by deepening our aspiration. When we keep the Heavenly Vision ever before us, and do not strive, nor struggle, nor run after it, we just become our heart’s desire.
—Julia Seton Sears, M.D.
Behind the clouds which obscure the vision the sun is always shining, and one need not abide in the shadow except by his own choice.
—Aaron Martin Crane.
Faith lives in the spirit and knows that anything that man may ask for is already in store for him. To pray is therefore not to stand apart from God and implore, but to enter into the Spirit of God and receive from His loving kindness what He is more than willing to give.
—C. D. Larson.
When you are true to your consciousness many rare buds will blossom.
—Ida Gatling Pentecost.
There is to-day an unlimited supply of All-Good provided in the unseen for every human being. No man must needs have less that another may have more. Your very own awaits you. Your understanding faith and trust is the power which will bring it to you.
—H. Emilie Cody.
The life of Christ shows us that the whole man can be regenerated as he stands; that we have not to wait for a future state; that the Kingdom of Heaven is in our midst and may be assimilated by us here and now.
—Sir Oliver Lodge.
“As a man thinketh, so is he”; and since even desultory thinking is creative and brings results, we have discovered that premeditated, orderly thinking for a purpose matures that purpose into fixed form, so that we may be absolutely sure of the result of our dynamic experiment.
—Frances Larimer Warner.
There are three things necessary to the realization of any desire:
- The understanding that desire itself is God given, that it is the divine urge along higher paths.
- The knowledge that God is the sum and substance of every imaginable good, which we desire now, or ever can desire.
- The belief that God is willing—even determined—to pour all good into our lives now, as well as in the infinite reaches of the future.
—Florence Morse Kingsley.
Clothe yourself about with the Infinite Love and Wisdom, and know that only your own good can come to you.
—Julia Seton Sears, M.D.
We cannot enter into the Jesus Christ consciousness fully so long as we have a grudge against anyone. The mind is so constituted that a single thought of a discordant character tinges the whole consciousness; so we must cast out all evil and resisting thoughts before we can know the love of God in its fullness.
—Charles Fillmore.
God is not inaccessible to us in the sense that we receive nothing from Him. His riches surpass our power to receive; so that with all our searching, all our capacity, we cannot exhaust our Creator.
—Elwood Worcester.
As you would have God act toward you, so act toward all men. All thoughts, words, and deeds that we send forth to men return to us, coming directly from men, or indirectly as a decree or dispensation of our God. Therefore Jesus summarizes all things in the great Golden Rule.
—Annie Rix Militz.
The soul that is always grateful lives nearer the true, the good, the beautiful, and the perfect than anything else in existence. And the more closely we live to the good and the beautiful, the more of these things can come into our lives.
—C. D. Larson.
What one thinks most about, he either becomes or grows like, and it is the tendency and function of the physical organism to mirror it forth. Let us, then, train our minds to focalize themselves upon those qualities and things that we wish to manifest, rather than upon what we would like to avoid.
—Henry Wood.
There is a divine sequence running throughout the universe. Within and above and below the human will incessantly works the Divine will. To come into harmony with it, and thereby with all the higher laws and forces, is to come into possession of unknown riches, into the realization of undreamed-of powers.
—Ralph Waldo Trine.
All forces make us suffer till we conquer them. Then they become our willing and obedient servants. When we work with certitude instead of hope, we always arrive at positive results.
—Charles B. Newcomb.
* We build our future, thought by thought,
Or good or bad, and know it not—
Yet so the universe is wrought.
Thought is another name for fate,
Choose, then, thy destiny, and wait—
For love brings love, and hate brings hate.
—Ella Wheeler Wilcox.
* Copyrighted by Ella Wheeler Wilcox.
Serene minds cast the reflection of their tranquil beauty before them, and who retains sweet thoughts moves evermore in a garden of roses.
—Stanton Davis Kirkham.
The windows of heaven are always open. It is our windows that are often closed.
—Charles B. Newcomb.
Oh, Soul, all the universe bestirs itself to help you fit in and be happy. All the beauty of the universe is pressing OUT through you into expression. All things that you desire are welling up within you, pressed upward by a ceaseless and almighty urge that CANNOT be gainsaid. There is nothing you ever dreamed of, or hoped for, or longed for, even in your moments of wildest imagining, that is not actually pressing, pressing, urging to rise through you into visibility—that is not doing its best to well up and transform you and all your environment with its radiant, beautiful flow. Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, nor hath it entered into the heart of you to conceive the glories that are aching to flow through you and be free. There is more beauty, and art, and brilliance, wit and wisdom, fine raiment and money trying, trying to come upward and outward through YOU than this blessed world has yet seen.
—Elizabeth Towne.
God has called us to be stewards of His. He has chosen us as vessels to carry good to others, and it is only while carrying to others that we ourselves can be filled.
—H. Emilie Cody.
When we feel a sense of unity, an at-oneness with the Creator, we cannot fear, we cannot want, because we are in the very midst of the supply, in the very lap of abundance.
It is impossible for God’s image and likeness in man to reflect failure or poverty. Man’s divine image reflects prosperity, riches that are royal, divine abundance that never fails, plenty that can never grow less.
—Orison Swett Marden.
Whoever needs thee is thy neighbor, and thy neighbor requires kindness in thought more than food or clothes.
—Adelaide Keen.
Man is meant for happiness, and that happiness is within his reach. “The Kingdom of heaven is at hand” indeed, and man may dwell therein if he will. Joy, pleasure, peace, are all the results of right thinking, and there is no reason why everyone may not have them. The truth, the beauty, the grandeur, the inspiration, the unspeakable happiness, are for every man and are obtainable by him.
—Aaron Martin Crane.
Nothing is impossible to him whose will has merged itself in the will of God. This is the only secret of the marvelous work of Jesus; and He distinctly affirmed that what He did, all may do, and “even greater things.”
—Lilian Whiting.
Fear is a most expensive guest to entertain, the same as worry is; so expensive are they that no one can afford to entertain them. We invite what we fear, the same as, by a different attitude of mind, we invite and attract the influences and conditions we desire.
—Ralph Waldo Trine.
Become so great you can see love in everything you are passing through.
—Ida Gatling Pentecost.
In Tune With The Infinite
The more one loves the nearer he approaches to God, for God is the spirit of infinite love. And when we come into the realization of our oneness with this Infinite Spirit, then divine love so fills us that, enriching and enrapturing our own lives, from them it flows out to enrich the life of all the world.
In coming into the realization of our oneness with the Infinite Life, we are brought at once into right relations with our fellowmen. We are brought into harmony with the great law, that we find our own lives in losing them in the service of others. We are brought to a knowledge of the fact that all life is one, and so that we are all parts of the one great whole. We then realize that we can’t do for another without at the same time doing for ourselves. We also realize that we cannot do harm to another without by that very act doing harm to ourselves. We realize that the man who lives to himself alone lives a little, dwarfed, and stunted life, because he has no part in this larger life of humanity. But the one who in service loses his own life in this larger life, has his own life increased and enriched a thousand or a million fold, and every joy, every happiness, everything of value coming to each member of this greater whole comes as such to him, for he has a part in the life of each and all.
—Ralph Waldo Trine.
SECTION II
Laurel crowns cleave to deserts,
And power to him who power exerts.
Hast not thy share? On winged feet
Lo! it flyeth thee to meet.
All that nature made thine own,
Floating in air or pent in stone,
Will rive the hills, and swim the sea,
And like thy shadow follow thee.
—Emerson.
Everyone’s thought images are being constantly impressed both upon himself and others. His mind is a busy factory where conditions are positively manufactured. . . . His mental pictures of evil, disorder, and disease, photograph themselves not only upon his own mind and body, but upon those of his fellows.
—Henry Wood.
Your ideal is like a silver vase, always pure silver, but tarnished with false impressions; so all we have to do is to remove the tarnish by affirming and seeing the bright, shining reality. So, do you not see that you are not to produce something— only come to your own ? Remember “Whatsoever you desire” is already yours and “Nothing shall be impossible to you.”
—Frances Larimer Warner.
When one begins to live in the depth of real life, and begins to draw upon his own inexhaustible self, he will find that he is so much that there is no end to the possibilities that exist in his own life and his own world.
—C. D. Larson.
Everyone who influences us impresses us with his command of self; not by what he says but because he is. In other words, we feel his atmosphere. . . . Remember your atmosphere goes forth constantly to those about you without effort on your part.
—Katharine H. Newcomb.
“Judge not according to appearances, judge righteous judgment.” Look below the surface of things to find the truth, the reality. Remember that all men are working out their salvation, that none is guiltless, that none is able to cast the first stone.
—Horatio W. Dresser.
Go where we will, the plentiful river of life flows on beneath the canopy of heaven. . . . Not our concern the depth of this river, or its width, or the strength of its current, as it streams on forever, pertaining to all; but of deepest importance to us is the size and the purity of the cup that we plunge in its waters.
—Maurice Maeterlinck.
Refuse to be frightened by anything in your environment.
—Julia Seton Sears, M.D.
I raise my mind from all appearances of limitation to the consciousness of the one Omnipotent Power and affirm that I am the recipient of all its goodness and love.
—Walter De Voe.
If one loves God, sets his love upon Him, he abides in the Secret Place under the shadow of the Almighty. To abide is to have such love that the interest and attention are centered on the God within, instead of being fixed upon the unstable, ever-changing things of the outer world; and, by abiding, all things in the without fall into harmony with the within.
—Edna L. Carter.
He who will attain the highest inward blessedness must work with God to increase the happiness of all.
—Elwood Worcester.
The place of mastery is in the mind, and he who would be master must enter into that place, and work from it to the external.
—Charles Fillmore.
Victory must be won in the silence of your own soul first, and then you need take no part in the outer demonstration or relief from conditions. The very walls of Jericho, which keep you from your desire, must fall before you.
—H. Emilie Cady.
As long as one judges by appearances he can never see and feel that “All is Good.” Get down to the verities of life, to the things which are eternal, and it all looks easy.
—Elizabeth Towne.
It is the mental attitude that stamps circumstances, and not circumstances that stamp the mental attitude.
—Lilian Whiting.
God is always at our service. The divine circuits flow perpetually. The path of life is always open and hides no obstacles nor hindrances. It is due to our distorted vision that we see “giants in Canaan,” and in their sight we think we are as grasshoppers.
—Charles B. Newcomb.
The race has sought for power, control, and understanding in many ways; it has given science, religion, and philosophies every sort of trial. But it is being born into the minds of those who are consecrated to the search of wisdom, that if they ever hope to come to the real understanding of life, they must deepen their own consciousness until they are related with everything seen and unseen, and become one with the things created, finding through these the energy that creates.
—Julia Seton Sears, M.D.
Christ was not poor. He was conscious of boundless resources right at hand. No child of God need fear present poverty, nor hoard for a rainy day, nor want—anything.
—Florence Morse Kingsley.
Our highest aspirations and longings for something better are a sign that better things exist. It is not given to the creature to exceed the Creator in imagination or in goodness; and the best and highest we can imagine shall be more than fulfilled by reality—in due time.
—Sir Oliver Lodge.
The strong soul is never disturbed or made unhappy by meeting things out of place; he does not have to suggest to himself that all is well, when it is not, in order to keep himself composed. He knows that he is ready for any emergency, that he is equal to any occasion, that he has the power to meet and overcome any adversity, and that he has the ability to make all wrongs right.
—C. D. Larson.
We cannot hear spiritually if continually listening with the outer ear to inharmony. We cannot see spiritually with clear vision, while using our eyes to criticise and condemn.
—Katharine H. Newcomb.
Never give a moment to complaint, but utilize the time that would otherwise be spent in this way in looking forward and actualizing the conditions you desjre. Suggest prosperity to yourself, see yourself in a prosperous condition. . . . You thus make yourself a magnet to attract the things you desire
—Ralph Waldo Trine.
As the sun cannot shine into a dark cellar when shut out, so wealth cannot flow to us individually, when shut out by our doubts and fears, and belief in lack as the reality.
—Frances Larimer Warner.
Faith opens the door that enables us to look into the soul’s limitless possibilities and reveals such powers there, such unconquerable forces, that we are not only encouraged to go on, but feel a great consciousness of added power because we have touched Omnipotence, have a glimpse of the great source of things.
—Orison Swett Marden.
Prayer is not for the purpose of informing God of your needs. Your Father knows just what spiritual realities you need to bring forth the desire of your heart. The object of prayer is to place ourselves and those we pray for in a receptive state to receive the divine blessings that are ever being outpoured.
—Annie Rix Militz.
In everything that happens is there light; and the greatness of the greatest of men has but consisted in that they had trained their eyes to be open to every ray of this light.
—Maurice Maeterlinck.
Desire in the heart for anything is God’s sure promise sent beforehand to indicate that it is yours already in the limitless realm of supply; and whatever you want you can have for the taking.
—H. Emilie Cody.
Misjudge no one. The Universal is lifting higher and higher. In individual ways you and I are pushing on, as the flower pushes up through the dirt. When we were ignorant, we did as ignorance does; now we know better, we have changed. Care what no one says—only what you are! Buds come to be roses, and roses do not ridicule buds. The sun kisses the twigs that we may have the apple blossoms. Do not criticize the soul that is in embryo; rather let your light shine.
—Ida Gatling Pentecost.
An ideal attained always reveals another and diviner possibility. Each is a bow of promise beckoning onward. God has arranged it so in the beautiful order of His creation.
—Aaron Martin Crane.
The secret of all spiritual religion is the union of the human soul with the divine soul, the belief that man’s spirit and God’s spirit are in their essence one.
—Elwood Worcester.
The atmosphere with which we surround ourselves becomes in a measure the magnet of our destiny.
—Stanton Dams Kirkham.
It is not what we have that makes us rich, but what we can appreciate and enjoy.
—Adelaide Keen.
Paul declares: “All things are yours.” We enter into their possession through consciousness. If we fail to receive the great heritage bequeathed to the offspring of the Infinite, the fault is only our own.
—Henry Wood.
A truly consecrated life promptly rejects every thought of past or future that would disturb its confidence in the present hour.
—Charles B. Newcomb.
* Talk Happiness!
The world is sad enough without your woes.
No path is wholly rough. . . .
Say you are well, or all is well with you—
And God shall hear your words and make them
true.
—Ella Wheeler Wilcox.
* Copyrighted by Ella Wheeler Wilcox.
When everything looks dark and there is no silver lining in sight, create a silver lining in the imagination, and by concentrating attention upon that bright picture with faith, determination, and power, we prevent going down into weakness, confusion, and failure. Give the mind something bright to think of, and it will go up; it will rise out of darkness into silvery brightness. It will leave adversity behind, the victory will be gained, and the coveted goal will be a dream no more.
—C. D. Larson.
Gods Hand
There is but one hand in the universe. It is God’s hand. Whenever you have felt that your hand was empty it has been because you have believed yourself something separate from God. Have you not felt at times great desire to give to others something they needed or wanted, and have not been able?
From whence, suppose you, comes this desire to give? Is it from the mortal of you? Nay, nay, it is the voice of the Giver of all good gifts crying out through you. It is God’s desire to give through you. Cannot He afford to give whenever and wherever He will, and not be made poorer but richer thereby? Your hand is God’s hand. My hand is God’s hand. Our Father reaches out through these, His only hands, to give His gifts. We have nothing to do with the supply. Our part is to pass out freely, and without ceasing, the good gift.
The supply is inexhaustible. Its outflow can only be limited by demand. Nothing can ever hinder the hand which is consciously recognized as God’s hand from being refilled, except, as was the case where the widow’s oil was multiplied through Elisha, “there is not a vessel more to receive it.” Let not the seeming emptiness of your hand at times stagger your faith for a moment. It is just as full when you do not see it as when you do. Keep right on recognizing it as God’s right hand in which are all good gifts now. And thus you will prove Him who said, “Prove me now herewith, saith the Lord of hosts, if I will not open to you the windows of heaven and pour out to you a blessing that there shall not be room enough to receive it.”
—H. Emilie Cody.
SECTION III
Great men are they who see that spiritual force is stronger than material force; that thoughts rule the world.
—Emerson.
Before we can bring happiness to others, we first must be happy ourselves; nor will happiness abide within us unless we confer it on others.
—Maurice Maeterlinck.
Remember that obstacles are the dumb-bells of the soul, and that there is no defeat except to give up. .
—Ida Gatling Pentecost.
After any object or purpose is clearly held in thought, its precipitation, in tangible and visible form, is merely a question of time. Columbus saw in vision a path through the trackless waters around the world. The vision always precedes, and itself determines the realization.
—Lilian Whiting.
All you need to insure the greatest success is to consecrate yourself an empty vessel to the one intelligence and source of supply that knows no limitation at all.
—Frances Larimer Warner.
There is nothing that will bring us such abundant returns as to take a little time in the quiet each day of our lives. We need this to get the kinks out of our minds, and hence out of our lives. We need this to form better the higher ideals of life.
—Ralph Waldo Trine.
When you go to sleep in the right mental attitude you will be surprised to find how serene and calm, how refreshed and cheerful, you will be when you awake in the morning, and how much easier it will be to start right and to wear a smile for the day than it was when you went to bed worrying, ill-humored, or full of ungenerous, uncharitable thoughts.
—Orison Swett Harden.
When a thing is put in the hands of the Spirit, it should not be touched by mortal thought. Put your entire trust in the Lord and He will bring it to pass.
—Charles Fillmore.
No occupation is so burdensome that it cannot be made an opportunity for the growth of character. No tyrant is so cruel that the oppressed may not display sweetness and love and forgiveness. No prison walls are so narrow as to exclude the Christ, no cell so dark that the light of God may not shine therein.
—Horatio W. Dresser.
We unfold through love. We unfold through confidence in the higher self and forgetting the personal self. We unfold through knowing that we are related to the source of all things—God.
—Katharine H. Newcomb.
A merry heart will ever remain the best medicine, and sweet thoughts are angels, and gentle smiles a benediction.
—Stanton Davis Kirkham.
It is only by revealing the divine that is in us that we may discover the divine in others.
—Maurice Maeterlinck.
What is it to see God? And how may we purify our hearts? These are the two questions which men and women are asking everywhere to-day. And the answer is so clear—so beautifully simple. If we will but open our hearts to God, they will become whiter than snow in the flame of His Spirit. If we are but willing to see, we will “let” that mind be in us which was also in Christ Jesus. Then shall we know Him as the Father of our spirits, the creator of all created things, immanent in His creation, yet transcendent. This it is to see God!
—Florence Morse Kingsley.
All the good that is to be manifest in a man’s life is already an accomplished fact in the Divine Mind. It lies with men to call into manifestation that which already is an absolute and established creation in God.
—Annie Rix Militz.
To have success, quit seeking it. Be it. Get down to yourself; down to your thoughts, your feelings, your desires.
—Elizabeth Towne.
* It isn’t raining rain to me,
It’s raining thoughts of love;
In every jeweled drop I see
A message from above.
The clouds of gray engulf the day
But ne’er produce a frown.
It isn’t raining rain to me,
It’s raining treasures down.
It’s raining all things Good to me
From out the Great Unseen;
The very things my heart hath craved,
Surpassing every dream—
Health, wisdom, love, and joy supreme,
I claim my very own;
It isn’t raining rain to me,
It’s raining God’s love down.
—Helen B. True.
We can surely learn to do more than we have yet accomplished—more, even, than we have yet conjectured as within the range of possibility.
—Sir Oliver Lodge.
“There is something that maketh a palace out of four little walls of a room” and this “something” is the Cosmic relationship of our mind with its mind. When we have Cosmic relationship, and have it consciously, we can make our atmosphere just what we desire it to be, no matter where our life may lead us.
—Julia Seton Sears, M.D.
Our eyes and ears are like golden buckets by which we are enabled to draw up water of life from the deep well of life. They are treasure boxes God placed in our hands when He sent us into this marvellous world that we might not return to Him empty handed.
—Elwood Worcester.
What we want is ours. The fact that we have the power to want it, proves that we have the power to get it. What we desire is our own in the ideal, and will shortly become our own in the real, if we press on, regardless of conditions to-day.
—C. D. Larson.
In lack of whatever kind “ask and believe ye receive”; that is, ask and begin immediately, even without any visible evidence, to affirm “God is (not will be) my supply right here and now.” Be determined about it; He will surely manifest Himself according to His promise.
—H. Emilie Cody.
Whatever changes time may bring, understanding the law, we shall always expect something better, and thus set into operation the forces that will attract that something, realizing that many times angels go out that arch-angels may enter in.
—Ralph Waldo Trine.
When you are in doubt as to the right thing to do in attaining your rights in worldly affairs, ask that this eternal Spirit of Justice shall go forth in your behalf and bring about and restore to you that which is your very own.
—Charles Fillmore.
Love’s full music comes when the soul stirs. Its chords the winds of heaven play upon, that we may tune up with the Infinite. Bliss is born when our feelings are educated, and Summer’s heart sighs when we do not get her message of perpetual growth and unfoldment. Laugh with the gladness in nature. Be born fresh every morning. Work and play at intervals. . . . Radiate health, and emphasize optimism. Declare for the good, and fear nothing but unkindness and ignorance.
—Ida Gatling Pentecost.
We must cultivate that broad spirit of universal charity which sees beyond appearances into the soul of things, for only by this spirit do we enter into the harmony that pervades the inner nature of life and becomes attuned to Godlike emotions.
—Walter De Voe.
I create a harmonious environment by projecting thought only of the good.
—Henry Wood.
It is your glorious duty to manifest all the gladness you can imagine, not only all you can see. Then, behold, beauty will blossom like the rose and God will look down and smile at this child, and give you something you have longed for, to rejoice over!
—Adelaide Keen.
When man obeys God, when he sets his heart to righteous thinking, and sends forth his true word, he sets into operation forces which bring his good to him so quietly and so quickly that nothing better expresses the manner of the coming of his blessings than to say that they have overtaken him.
—Edna L. Carter.
We are beginning to learn that man carries the great panacea for all ills within himself; that the antidotes for the worst poisons—the poisons of hatred, jealousy, anger, revenge, a false ambition, and of all evil thoughts and passions—exist in his own mind in the form of love, charity, and goodwill essences.
—Orison Swett Harden.
Hard work, with a peaceful, harmonious mind, will never kill any one; and when it is accompanied by serenity, hope, and joy, it builds up the system and prolongs existence instead of shortening it; but worry kills, and not to stop it is slow but certain suicide as well as the destruction of much of the joy in the lives of one’s best and closest friends.
—Aaron Martin Crane.
One may accomplish wonders with soul power; it depends on our understanding of the law.
—Horatio W. Dresser.
On rising in the morning be as particular in plunging into your bath of joy as you are in taking your usual bath in water. Say over to yourself, “I am filled with joy; I am in an atmosphere of joy.” You cannot take colds or have headaches if you live in an atmosphere of joy. . . . Make your atmosphere so joyous that all who come near you will feel its buoyancy.
—Katharine H. Newcomb.
Nothing else so surely clears out all remembrance of wrongs suffered as to definitely and positively give—for to the offending one.
—H. Emilie Cody.
One With The Infinite
One with the Infinite, always in tune,
Harmony sweet as a bird-song in June;
Never a doubting thought, never a fear,
Always a sense of the Fatherhood near.
Peace like a river’s flow, restful and calm,
Flooding the soul with its heavenly balm;
Faith upward gazing, untrammeled, serene,
Grasping with boldness the treasures unseen.
Love all-enfolding in tenderness sweet,
Pity out-reaching a brother to greet;
Courage undaunted, o’er-mastering, strong,
Doing the right and denying the wrong.
Gladness unspeakable, life understood,
Knowing that all things are working for good;
Heaven close-throbbing, assistance to give,
One with the Infinite, this is to live.
—Emma Fisk-Smith.
SECTION IV
It is only as man puts off from himself all external support and stands alone that I see him to be strong and to prevail.
—Emerson.
I am in direct connection with the source of my supply. … I reach out, as the tree does, into the infinite abundance and draw with the compelling root of my desire all that I need.
—Florence Morse Kingsley.
It lies in the power of the least favored among us to be loyal and gentle and just, to be generous and brotherly.
—Maurice Maeterlinck.
For the soul to estimate or use its inner wealth, it is necessary to close the outer door of sense, and the more firmly I close the doors of the outer world, the brighter all becomes within, the more capable I become of putting forth the whole strength of the soul.
—Elwood Worcester.
When you are living in the spirit of progress, a failure in one direction means that there is something still better in store for you in another direction.
—C. D. Larson.
The lake that is in perpetual motion, now full of ripples and again thrown up into foaming waves, cannot give forth a true image of the ship that rests on its surface; so the mind that is ruffled by every passing breeze of feeling or lashed into waves of fear, anxiety, or anger because of externals, cannot easily and fairly reflect its ideal, though that image be held before it day and night without ceasing.
—Annie Rix Militz.
There is no more limit to the gratification of a right desire than there is to the air that one may breathe. Satisfaction and happiness are as infinite as the atmosphere. The only limitation is the degree of receptivity in man.
—Lilian Whiting.
The discordant thought should be dropped out of the mind as quickly as a red-hot coal would be dropped out of the hand, and another and harmonious thought should be welcomed in its place with equal celerity. Prompt and decisive action here will save much future effort.
—Aaron Martin Crane.
“Whatsoever ye desire, believe that you have received ” is based upon infallible science. ” Blessed are the eyes that see the things that ye see” implies a real substance not seen by the spiritually blind. . . . We absolutely must become as a little child, trusting where we cannot see, and ask, or rather give thanks, for having already received; then act as though God meant what He said.
—Frances Larimer Warner.
Your place is to do what you can, and have faith and know that what you desire is yours. In due time it will appear—”it shall be done.”
—Elizabeth Towne.
Our life is not in the future, but in the present, and it will always be in the present: it is in our life that we have to apply our beliefs, utilize our talents, and bring forth fruit. The Kingdom of Heaven is not only at hand, it is potentially in our midst and may be actually within us.
—Sir Oliver Lodge.
The grander natures and the more thoughtful are always looking for and in conversation dwelling on the better things in others. It is the rule with but few, if any exceptions, that the more noble and worthy and thoughtful the nature, the more it is continually looking for the best there is to be found in every life. Instead of judging or condemning, or acquiring the habit that eventually leads to this, it is looking more closely to and giving its time to living more worthily itself.
—Ralph Waldo Trine.
God made each one of us to be a radiating centre, constantly shining outwards towards others in a spirit of ministry and giving.
—H. Emilie Cady.
True prayer is not a petitioning, but a claiming; it is begotten not of infirmity of the will, but of assurance,—is not weakness, but strength; and he that apprehends the nature of Prayer bends not the knee but towers in majesty. He goes forth to meet his own; he ascends the mount to speak with God.
—Stanton Davis Kirkham
Man’s mind and body may be compared to a hive of bees. There is a constant gathering of substance by the busy thoughts, which is stored up in ten thousand little pockets in the subconsciousness. If new honey is desired, the old must be taken away. If you want your thoughts to gather the sweets of the Spirit, put away the stale honey of the old material life.
—Charles Fillmore.
Many soul skeletons are deformed. When you hurt another’s heart, the skeleton is bent out of shape. … A lack of doing unto others as they want to be done by, and as you would want done by you, were you in their place, crumbles the skeleton to dust.
—Ida Gatling Pentecost.
It was intended that we should all be rich and happy; that we should have an abundance of all the good things the heart can crave. We should live in the realization that there is an abundance of power where our present power comes from, and that we can draw upon this great source for as much as we can use.
—Orison Swett Marden.
The ideal is to be made real in each and in all: nothing is too good to be true.
—Sir Oliver Lodge.
Faith is the power that brings forth in living reality all the beauty and purpose of the ideal. Human eyes are forever blinded by human tears of doubt and human misgivings, fear and anxiety; but when the soul is filled with the vitalizing, spiritualizing energy of faith, it becomes one with something that lifts it above the dust of the earth and gives it a vision of effort so clear, so certain that in the midst of appalling obstacles it walks on and fears not.
—Julia Seton Sears, M.D.
The Omnipotent Will of God is holding worlds and solar systems in obedience to a harmonious order. You stand in the highest order of created beings, and you have the ability to come in direct contact with the Divine Will, to the end that it may express its purpose of perfection through your whole nature.
—Walter De Voe.
I know from experience that it is just a matter of choosing what we will have. This putting one’s self into the actual position desired, is acceptance, or active faith. We may affirm till doomsday and get no results, unless we at the same time, either consciously or subconsciously, see ourselves in possession. “Believe that ye have received ” bears strongly upon this argument.
—Frances Larimer Warner.
The more love we manifest, the more of God do we show, the more joy do we give and receive; for giving and receiving are one. No one can hurt you but yourself, so, see that your thoughts are pure, strong, loving, hopeful, ambitious.
—Adelaide Keen.
Prayer is the most powerful of motors, because it links man with the world of the Unseen; because it is a channel through which divine forces may pour themselves into his purpose and inform and determine his conduct.
—Lilian Whiting.
True life is unutterable sweetness, in which all the shadows of our yesterdays are woven into the soft tints of the morning sunshine.
—Charles B. Newcomb.
Cultivate gladness. Depression disappears just in proportion as one cultivates gladness and serenity.
—Aaron Martin Crane.
You are as you think; your thoughts are as your impressions, and your impressions come either from your environment or from your own superior ideas. What you are to be and what your fate is to be will therefore depend upon whether you think what is suggested by your surroundings, or think what you are inspired to think by the greatness that is within.
—C. D. Larson.
Naught do we ever truly possess but that which we give in our love; and whatever our love bestows, we are no longer alone to enjoy.
—Maurice Maeterlinck.
* With each strong thought,
With every earnest longing for aught
Thou deemest needful to thy soul,
Invisible vast forces are set thronging
Between thee and that goal.
‘Tis only when some hidden weakness alters
And changes thy desire, or makes it less,
That this mysterious army ever falters
Or stops short of success.
Thought is a magnet, and the longed-for pleasure
Or boon, or aim, or object, is the steel;
And its attainment hangs but on the measure
Of what thy soul can feel.
—Ella Wheeler Wikox.
* Copyrighted by Ella Wheeler Wilcox.
Don’t spend time looking for results. Just live the unfailing.
—Katharine H. Newcomb.
All that we are now is the result of our believing; every action and word shows forth what we have been believing, and are now holding in mind.
—Annie Rix Militz,
Oh, is it not glorious to learn at last that we are only suffering through our mistakes, not for them, as we used in our ignorance to think; and that Good, like the sunshine, is always and eternally pressing towards us, urging itself upon us, and finally urging so hard that we are compelled to awaken at last to the truth that we might have saved ourselves all of those hurts and bumps?
—Frances Larimer Warner.
The real purpose of this life is to make a soul, to fashion a spiritual organism; a soul, great it may be, but anyway sound, sweet, pure, and honest.
—Elwood Worcester.
The Master never claimed anything for Himself that He did not claim for all mankind; but, quite to the contrary, He said and continually repeated, “Not only shall ye do these things, but greater than these shall ye do, for I have pointed out to you the way,” meaning, though strange as it evidently seems to many, exactly what He said.
—Ralph Waldo Trine.
Our Own
OUR VERY OWN awaits us. It already exists in the realm of Infinite Supply, and it is our understanding faith which brings it to us; or rather, we, through our understanding faith, lift ourselves to the plane where we are in touch with OUR OWN, where we become one with the desires of our heart, where we have only to reach out and take what we will—and the great joy of it is that no one need have less in order that we may have more. There is an abundance for all; the supply is inexhaustible, and it simply remains for us to make conscious union with that supply, to enter into the kingdom where we shall find joys for the taking.
What we want is not someone else’s GOOD, but OUR OWN. It is awaiting our demand; yes, waiting to rush in upon us and flood our lives with sunshine. “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.” Let us no longer be content with the crumbs which fall from His table; let us arise and receive our heritage and partake of the bounteous feast which He “hath prepared” (not “will prepare”) for us; let us come to OUR OWN where we shall find fullness of joy and peace and power and plenty.
—Helen B. True
SECTION V
WHAT I MUST DO, is all that concerns me, not what the people think. … It is easy in the world to live after the world’s opinion; it is easy in solitude to live after our own; but the great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude.
—Emerson.
I will think only harmonious thoughts, and thereby I make harmony.
—Henry Wood.
Desire in the heart for anything is God’s sure promise sent beforehand to indicate that it is yours already in the limitless realm of supply; and whatever you want, you can have for the taking.
—H. Emilie Cody.
When a man loves perfection with all his heart, and soul, and mind, and strength, there will not be any place for inharmonious thoughts.
—Aaron Martin Crane.
As long as you radiate doubt and discouragement, you will be a failure. If you want to get away from poverty, you must keep your mind in a productive, creative condition. In order to do this you must think confident, cheerful, creative thoughts. The model must precede the statue. You must see a new world before you can live in it.
—Orison Swett Marden.
Never be downhearted; wonder at the abundance within you.
—Ida Gatling Pentecost.
The only victory worth making is the victory over one’s self; the only real success lies in the development of character and insight; the only thing worth seeking is the Soul; the only thing worth possessing is the Truth; the only thing worth living for is Love.
—Stanton Davis Kirkham.
Our spiritual abodes lack nothing that we need; but it is our will that attracts or drives away the pleasant and sweet things of life.
—Charles B. Newcomb.
God is so kind, so generous. If we once know Him as our Father, we can never again be afraid, or lonely, or poor, or lacking for any good thing.
—Florence Morse Kingsley.
Worry is a leak, a dissipation; it is a mortgage on power that takes all our spare energy to pay the interest, and keeps us with nose to the grindstone.
—Stanton Davis Kirkham.
Indebtedness of all kinds, physical or moral, is canceled in the same proportion and in the same manner as we cancel the debts that others owe us, for this is the outworking of the law and the prophets: that whatsoever ye do unto men, even so will your Father do unto you.
—Annie Rix Militz.
There are always two ways of doing a thing, but only one is the better way. To be sure of the better way is to leave out the self. Train the mind to forget the personal self by dwelling upon the spiritual self.
—Katharine H. Newcomb.
Learn to get the joy of living, the rapture of being alive.
—Julia Seton Sears, M.D.
Truth is. It is changeless, eternal, and it is undisturbed by enemies. It is mighty and prevails —not by struggle, but just by being. He who opposes it has a one-sided fight.
—Edna L. Carter.
We are always in touch with the hem of the garment and that’s all we have to know.
—Frances Larimer Warner.
When you have found principles that are true and ideas that contain the highest possibilities of human thought, stand by them even though everything you do goes wrong. Believe in your ideals, even when you are surrounded with everything but that which is ideal, and things will positively take a turn. Do not come down though everything in your world seems to be down; stand by your lofty position and the highest powers in your being will stand by you. Things will soon come up, adversity will disappear, the sunshine of good fortune will return, and a larger, richer, happier world will open its doors for you.
—C. D. Larson.
Practice the presence of God just as you would practice music.
—H. Emilie Cody.
The highest type of prayer has for its object not any material benefit, beyond those necessary for our activity and usefulness, but the enlightenment and amendment of our wills, the elevation of all humanity, and the coming of the Kingdom.
—Sir Oliver Lodge.
We shall come to our own sometime, and our own is the highest and best that we know; we shall come by being led in that we voluntarily follow our highest ideals and aspirations, our dreams, if you please, or we shall come by being pushed through suffering and loss and even anguish of soul, until we find all too concretely that the better pays, and more, that it will have obedience.
—Ralph Waldo Trine.
To “bless” is to magnify spiritually. It is another form of praise. Its mental law is increase— multiplication. Jesus always blessed what He had in hand as a working capital, and it was increased—the few loaves and fishes expanded under this law to the satisfaction of the hunger of thousands.
—Charles Fillmore.
A sorrow your soul has changed into sweetness, to indulgence or patient smiles, is a sorrow that shall never return without spiritual ornament; and a fault or defect you have looked in the face can harm you no more, or even be harmful to others.
—Maurice Maeterlinck.
An ideal is a responsibility; it is the working model that God has set before the individual; the pattern after which and by which he shall shape his life. If he accept and follow it with fidelity and energy; with that energy born of absolute faith in the Divine leading—he will find himself miraculously led; he will find that the obstacle which appears so insurmountable in perspective vanishes as he comes near; that a way is made, a path appears.
—Lilian Whiting.
A spirit truly poised is not dependent for its happiness on anything outside itself.
—Charles B. Newcomb.
“For God, who holds planets in their orbits and gives minutest care to every unseen cog and wheel in His universe, has given you the land where you have set your foot,” step by step. You are one with His power. All the angels sing and the atoms dance together, over the soul which returns to his inheritance. No more husks for the prodigal son.
—Adelaide Keen.
If you would keep young, you must learn the secret of self-rejuvenation, self-refreshment, self renewal, in your thought, in your work. Hard thoughts, too serious thoughts, mental confusion, excitement, worry, anxiety, jealousy, the indulgence of explosive passions, all tend to shorten life.
—Orison Swett Harden.
Be as the bush that presses through storms blossomward. No trouble can curse or blight you. Out from the dark earth comes the rose. Out of each sorrow comes a glad to-morrow.
—Ida Gatling Pentecost.
Prayer is conscious union with Cosmic Intelligence; prayer is not supplication; it is Oneness.
—Julia Seton Sears, M.D.
As a swan, swimming on the bosom of a lake, gives rise to innumerable waves which are continuous, so that the first is united to the last, so man passes through this world. However broken his life and influence may seem, it produces one continuous series of effects.
—Elwood Worcester.
In all your efforts to grow into the better, the greater, and the more beautiful, consider the lilies of the field; grow like the flower and you will never fail. The flower resists nothing, antagonizes nothing, works against nothing; it gently comes out of its gross and earthy environment, and grows on peacefully, silently, and serenely until it becomes an inspiration to all the world.
—C. D. Larson.
The sun shines upon all alike, the good and the evil, without respect to social standing, and each suffers or is made glad according to his life.
—Horatio W. Dresser.
The infinite Father has not given man the aspiration for better things merely to deny him at the last. He does not mock His children. The attainment of this goal is more than a possibility: it is a certainty.
—Aaron Martin Crane.
To love truth because of the Truth is the essence of refinement; and to be true to one’s self is to be moral.
—Stanton Davis Kirkham.
The conditions of a man’s life accompany and attend him wherever he may go. If he evade them in one form they arise in another. He cannot cross the ocean and leave them behind. They take their passage when he takes his, and they lie down with him at night and arise with him in the morning. Once overcome, they depart. Their work is done
—Lilian Whiting.
Let us “turn our clouds about,” seeing in a great disappointment the opportunity for unfoldment. Let us rejoice in the opportunity, seeing only good in it; or if we cannot see the good at the present moment, know it is good without a doubt.
—Katharine H. Newcomb.
We are born to be neither slaves nor beggars, but to dominion and to plenty. . . . Many a one is to-day longing for conditions better and higher than he is in, who might be using the same time now spent in vain, indefinite, spasmodic longings, in putting into operation forces which, accompanied by the right personal activity, would speedily bring the fullest realization of his fondest dreams.
—Ralph Waldo Trine.
Recognize nothing as imposition, but only as opportunities to render divine service, and finally, by perfect non-resistance, all form of imposition shall be overcome and pass utterly out of your life.
—Annie Rix Militz.
What is your estimate of the conditions that environ you? When you understand that which seems to oppress and bind you, you perceive its powerlessness. You find that it has no such power as you have been giving it.
—Charles Fillmore.
For You
In God’s great storehouse of Love lies the fulfillment of your least and greatest desire. You need not struggle nor toil — you only need to know. Close your eyes to limitation and be assured that, according to your word and demands, be it unto you. How long is it going to take you to live aware of your divine inheritance? Calmly, closely look at your degree of consciousness. If there is meagerness in the outward expression of your life, it is but a scant consciousness you possess.
Your thoughts have made both you and your environment. If you wish to change it, change your thoughts; and the picture there registered and held to, will by and by become externalized. What are you seeing with your inner eye? The powerhouse is within — work there. . . . This so-called “mortal-mind” of ours never is sure when it is right, and never knows when it is wrong. It brings all sorts of confusion upon us, till we use our “divine,” and through its truth reach freedom — from slavery, deception, and disease. We can be transformed from bondage to freedom, from oppression to dominion. . . .
Does a voice tell you there is a lack? There is no lack in vitality, or abundance. Mount to your spiritual spaces and partake of all and anything you want from Infinite Love. It is inexhaustible. Your every yearning can be supplied. Take from this limitless Source what you will. The more it gives, the more it has to give. All that is required is that you believe. Hold to this in confidence. Ask for what you want, and believe it is yours. Give it time to pass from invisibility to visibility. Asking, believing, and waiting will bring anything to you. If you do not reach out and take your own, you will have to go without it. All good things are for you. All, all is for you.
—Ida Gatling Pentecost.
SECTION VI
The great heart will no more complain of the obstructions that make success hard than of the iron walls of the gun which hinder the shot from scattering. .
—Emerson.
He who looks with steadfastness to his Highest Ideal, will with the utmost certainty realize it. And, as he approaches its realization, he will find still higher Ideals forming within him. The free and constant inspiration of the Almighty giveth him higher and yet higher understanding.
—Elizabeth Towne.
If we decree or affirm unwaveringly, steadfastly, we hold God by His own unalterable laws to do the establishing or fulfilling.
—H. Emilie Cody.
If we wish to train our voices to sing true we must not listen so much to discords. We must drop our habits of criticism. We must look for the sweet things in life and not the sour. We must gather flowers instead of nettles.
—Charles B. Newcomb.
There is but one thing that never can turn into suffering, and that is the good we have done.
—Maurice Maeterlinck.
I believe when we come to consider all desire for the beautiful as only the craving of the soul for its own rightful estate, we will take a different viewpoint concerning the demonstrating of a more refined environment and see that one cannot be too selfish regarding its rights. … I believe it is our duty to try to demonstrate harmonious environment, as that, as much as anything, conduces to peace of mind and admits of more time and freedom for spiritual growth and the working out of finally the highest ideals.
—Frances Larimer Warner.
No Ideal can grow in an atmosphere of doubt, fear, antagonism, or worry.
—Julia Seton Sears, M.D.
There is a storehouse of undreamed-of wealth to which every soul may have access; knock, and the door shall be opened to you.
—Stanton Davis Kirkham.
Whatever thoughts we listen to or speak or whatever thoughts we allow to remain in our mind will bear fruit. —Walter De Voe.
The true spiritual life does not mean the riches of the soul combined with weakness of the body, poverty of the person and ignorance of the mind. The true spiritual life is” an ideal life on all planes, and God is ready to provide us with everything that can make the whole of life ideal, if we only pray for it with the prayer that not only asks of God but also takes us to God.
—C. D. Larson.
A legal title may give outward control, but true ownership is deeper. In reality, one owns that which he can absorb, appropriate, and appreciate, and no more.
—Henry Wood.
Make each day as happy for someone as you can; live with confidence and patience. . . . The moment you have learned the lesson from what at present composes your life, release from the lesson will come, and you will pass on to a higher lesson.
—Ida Gatling Pentecost.
To do good for goodness’ sake is to fire the heart with love; for we cannot help loving those whom we willingly serve.
—Annie Rix Militz.
Each morning is a fresh beginning. We are, as it were, just beginning life. We have it entirely in our own hands. And when the morning with its fresh beginning comes, all yesterdays should be yesterdays, with which we have nothing to do.
—Ralph Waldo Trine.
It is within ourselves that reward must be found, for the law of gravitation will not swerve. They only who know not what goodness is are ever clamoring for the wage of goodness. Above all, let us never forget that an act of goodness is of itself always an act of happiness. No reward coming after the event can compare with the sweet reward that went with it.
—Maurice Maeterlinck.
To an illuminated will the perplexities of life are but the dust stirred by its chariot wheels in its triumphant progress. It takes joyfully the spoiling of its goods because it knows that every experience is friendly and helpful, and will feed its power.
—Charles B. Newcomb.
If we have any defect or weakness, we should hold firmly and persistently in mind, before we go to sleep, just the opposite characteristic or quality. This will tend to attract to us the thing we long for.
—Orison Swett Marden.
Whatsoever ye pray or ask for, believe that ye have received it and ye shall have it. It has already been given; it is already at hand in the kingdom waiting for us to come and take possession; … we may enter the kingdom and receive our own providing we enter in the name of the Christ, in the pure spiritual conception of the divine significance of that name.
—C. D. Larson.
No matter what you stand before in your life that seems not good to you, it is God—Good— whatever appearances may be. It can’t make you unhappy unless you let it. Anything you persist in looking at in this way will be transmuted, will be lifted off your life.
—Julia Seton Sears, M.D.
The sooner and the more fully one recognizes that it is not the incident, but one’s own thinking, which causes the trouble the better for him, because it will make his work of reform far less difficult.
—Aaron Martin Crane.
“Seek ye first the Kingdom”—of Heaven within You—”and all these things shall be added.” Heaven, then, is not a country or a place of clouds, and golden streets, and jeweled gates, but a state of mind which contains joys, figuratively described in Revelation. The revealing is individual and eternal to each soul, spiritually reborn into its inheritance.
—Adelaide Keen.
Spiritual energy is an infinite force; the more it is drawn upon, the larger is the supply, and it is given to man to use and to use now and here. It is his birthright. Spirituality of life lies in recognizing and using this exhaustless force to create the conditions in which one may be the most useful to others, and in which he shall find the greatest happiness and harmony for himself.
—Lilian Whiting.
He who lives constantly in the conviction that unbounded, spiritual strength is his inheritance now, will never for one moment feel that the flesh is weak. The flesh is what we make it, and it is just as easy to make it strong as to make it weak. Think that you are a weak, frail, human creature and the flesh will become the dwelling place of weakness; but know that you are a strong,.invincible, eternal soul, and the flesh will become the very embodiment of strength, and will be filled with life and power from on high.
—C. D. Larson.
Inherent in the human mind is the thought that somewhere, somehow, it ought to be able to bring to itself that which it desires and which would satisfy. This thought is but the foreshadowing of that which really is.
—H. Emilie Cody.
I believe in praising God as a means of mental upliftment. Gratitude praises God for the blessings that have been received and faith praises for the blessings about to be received, and thus are the debilitating effects of discouragement and all other depressing states overcome.
—Walter De Voe.
Think of a perfect state of mind. With the perfect imaged in your mind, you materialize perfection. Keep from your mind the Ideal, and you materialize imperfection. We lift ourselves to what we see.
—Ida Gatling Pentecost.
If we could build a palace of joy, where we could eat joyous meals, sleep joyously, breathe an at mosphere of joy, think what it would mean to us, could we spend a week in this palace! We ought to make happiness a chronic state. Happiness is a necessity to health. We cannot be well without joy.
—Katharine H. Newcomb.
Our ideal will never be met with in life unless we have first achieved it within us to the fullest extent in our power.
—Maurice Maeterlinck.
Circumstances are fluid; they are ready to flow in any direction, to take on any form, to pour themselves into any mold. The energy of spirit is the controller and the creator of destiny.
—Lilian Whiting.
Love does not seek its own, because it does not have to—its own comes to it without seeking.
—Charles Fillmore.
It is the setting your mind on things above that will eventually redeem you from all evil consciousness, within and without. Recognition of good will transform you, and nothing else can. There is only one important thing in life—to think good.
—Elizabeth Towne.
One ought not to consider his mental training complete until he can, with entire equanimity, meet all incidents which affect him personally and can consider them carefully with entire freedom from any discordant thinking or feeling.
—Aaron Martin Crane.
It is doubt and fear, timidity and cowardice, that hold us down and keep us in mediocrity— doing petty things when we are capable of sublime deeds.
—Orison Swett Marden.
Loving, giving, serving—these are the true signs. It matters not so much to whom we give as that we give; and inasmuch as we give to the least of God’s creatures, we give unto the Christ.
—Horatio W. Dresser.
Now this young man who had never thought anything but true thoughts had discovered that God not only made all things, but that He was all things. Instead of being a big, stern man, sitting on a tall throne somewhere off in the sky, God was the unseen, living presence, under and in all things; He was both the thought and the thinker, the real behind the seen.
—Florence Morse Kingsly.
There is but one real world for any one, and that is his thought world. . . . The kingdom of heaven is within, and should be erected upon an exact or scientific basis. Thinking creates its own distinctive environment.
—Henry Wood.
What To Do With Our Limitations
One who can wear a happy, smiling face through all the changing conditions of life gives evidence that he is making union with his limitations, and will soon outlive their power. Joy is a great psychological transformer; it creates and attracts.
We become free from limitations when we love the law of good with all our soul and all our life, and trust in our own untried capacity as we would trust in God Himself. Christ said, “If any will come after Me, let him take up his cross and follow Me.” This is all there is to do—just take up the limitations which have become such a cross in our life and follow the leading of higher consciousness which tells us that all things work together for our eternal advancement.
The one who knows this, who walks straightforward in the path of life, with no regret, no complaining, no despair, no backward glancing at his yesterdays, no faltering in his thought, following cheerily wherever life may lead, will soon turn the corner of the street and stand face to face with his heart’s desire, and find that peace which floweth like a river, making life’s valley cool and sweet. He comes then into a consciousness of universal freedom, where limitations fall from him like a wornout cloak. His life is poised far above the power of disturbing accidents and changes. He dwells in peace-crowned heights of human activity; he has never a sorrow or fear, his to-day of content is eternal.
—Julia Seton Sears, M.D.
SECTION VII
We pass for what we are. Character teaches above our wills. Men imagine that they communicate their virtue or vice only by overt actions, and do not see that virtue or vice emit a breath every moment.
—Emerson.
Prove that you can keep your joy in the midst of sorrow and hold your peace in the midst of torment, and you know from thenceforth that no man can take your joy from you. You have the fountain in yourself.
—Annie Rix Militz.
If we expect to receive anything from God who “giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not,” we must turn our faces toward Him like little children, and open our entire being to His incoming. We must not shut Him out by either a tense, rigid, mental condition of anxiety, or by an unforgiving spirit.
—H. Emilie Cody.
Successful persons do not believe in failure. They believe in their own ability to overcome every obstacle to success, and this faith built on their own I Am—on their own souls—overcomes every hindrance.
—Walter De Voe.
Wherever perfect love and willing service exist, there already is the Kingdom.
—Sir Oliver Lodge.
When we live fully in our Ideal, everything we touch takes on the color of that Ideal.
—Julia Seton Sears, M.D.
The other side of each cloud is bright. , After each storm comes the rainbow. Be a rainbow yourself. Cultivating the Happy Habit, no matter what occurs, is to reach out and place on your heart God’s smile; for happiness is the understanding that all is good. People are only unhappy because they refuse to learn. Up, then, into the glory of Perception! Be joyous! Each day be happy! Try it, and know the blessed relief that lies in the “habit.”
—Ida Gatling Pentecost.
Love contains no complete and lasting happiness save in the transparent atmosphere of perfect sincerity. . . . But it is impossible to be sincere with others before learning to be sincere with one’s self.
—Maurice Maeterlinck.
It is your divine birthright to be joyously, perfectly happy.
—Frances Larimer Warner.
Give thanks for everybody and everything, and every condition that shows you your weakness, for at the same time it shows you your strength.
—Katharine H. Newcomb.
Faith walks on the mountain tops, hence its superior vision. It sees what is invisible to those who follow.
—Orison Swett Harden.
We cannot play the chords of “success” upon an instrument relaxed by disappointment and discouragement, nor with the harp-strings held at nervous tension by anxiety and fear. . . . Only a masterful confidence in the universal Life and in ourselves as its expression can strike the notes of power and produce the clear, full tones in which true purpose finds complete accomplishment.
—Charles B. Newcomb.
We cannot afford to withhold from giving our time, our intellect, our love, our money, to whomsoever need, for the law is that withholding makes poorer.
—H. Emitie Cody.
You are a magnet for whatever you desire, and things gravitate toward you and you toward them by the law of attraction.
—Walter De Voe.
“All things are yours,” said Saint Paul. One has but to take his own; to wisely and clearly select the elements and combine them by that irresistible potency of mental magnetism and energy.
—Lilian Whiting.
Man believes in God because he needs God, and when his needs are greatest believes most firmly.
—Elwood Worcester.
So long as the nature of your personal action is no better than the environment in which you live, you will continue in that environment; but the moment you begin to improve the quality, the power, and the efficiency of your personal action you will positively have the opportunity to enter better environments.
—C. D. Larson.
No one can hurt or wound; they but strike mistakenly at themselves.
—Ida Gatling Pentecost.
A most excellent way to turn the thoughts from discordant channels into harmonious ones is to look habitually for the good, both in persons and in things.’
—Aaron Martin Crane.
Get rid of your prejudices and most of your problems will disappear.
—Adelaide Keen
We must resolve that nothing shall antagonize us. … As we repel things, they repel us.
—Henry Wood.
Drop out of your mind your belief in good things and good events coming to you in the future. Come now into the real life, and coming, appropriate and actualize them now. Remember that only the best is good enough for one with a heritage so royal as yours.
—Ralph Waldo Trine.
Every life can say ” I know that my Redeemer liveth,” but its Redeemer is its own consciousness linked with the Divine.
—Julia Seton Sears, M.D.
The thing achieved is temporary, but the development of power to achieve is permanent.
—Lilian Whiting.
When a good thought comes we are to lay right hold of it, keep it in mind, repeat it over and over, until it becomes our very own—until it is established in our heart.
—Edna L. Carter
If we give ear to other voices we cannot hear the voice of Infinite Wisdom.
—Charles B. Newcomb.
Purification of mind and body, and clearness of heart, come first in the process of unfoldment.
—Ida Gatling Pentecost.
The creative power of Divine Mind enters into man’s work when he makes his mind receptive thereto. When the mind is in turmoil through wrong understanding, it cannot perfectly receive and express the ideals of Divine Mind.
—Charles Fillmore.
The purifying force of the avowal depends upon the quality of the soul that makes it and of the soul that receives it. Once that the balance is established, avowals raise the level of happiness and love. So soon as they are confessed, old lies or new, the most serious weaknesses change into unexpected ornaments and, like beautiful statues in a park, become the smiling witnesses and placid demonstrations of the clearness of the day.
—Maurice Maeterlinck.
Just think joy and gladness, and peace and wealth, and the environment will soon tally with your persistent thinking. Matter is never selfacting but acted upon by thought.
—Frances Larimer Warner.
Assert your possession of the things you need; of the qualities you long to own. Force your mind toward your goal; hold it there steadily, persistently, for this is the mental condition that creates.
—Orison Swett Marden.
Men often succeed by the very impetus of their own self-confidence, that is, by the power of their harmonious thoughts and the absence of self-distrust and self-condemnation; while others with far greater ability signally fail for no reason except their own hesitation and fear, born of doubt of themselves.
—Aaron Martin Crane.
Power is the privilege of kings. Be a king over yourself.
—Adelaide Keen.
Every man comes into the world with a title to all that is; it remains for him to prove it through capacity.
—Stanton Davis Kirkham.
The Song Of Life
We will answer life’s song in a spirit of service.
Service is the law of harmony as it is the law of love.
It is in activities for others that we gain the largest freedom for ourselves.
In teaching others songs of gladness we open fountains of melody in our own hearts. In guiding others to the light our twilight is dispelled. In feeding others we appease our hunger. In helping others we grow strong.
We are never without our opportunities of service. Every opportunity brings with it its own power. Every sincere thought or act of helpfulness is an impulse of spiritual development.
We think sometimes that it belongs to those who possess to give.
Possession comes through giving, and not giving through possession.
The universal stores of God are open to every honest demand. God’s work is never hindered for the want of supplies. Our theories of benevolence are often at fault, and we are apt to think the thing we ought to give is that which we cannot command.
Responsibility and opportunity never exist apart. If we discover one we may know that the other is close at hand.
When we have learned that every human being is a part of the harmony we very soon begin to know its laws. When we are ready to obey them the discords of life are ended.
—Charles B. Newcomb.
SECTION VIII
O believe, as thou livest, that every sound that is spoken over the round world, which thou oughtest to hear, will vibrate on thine ear. Every proverb, every book, every by-word that belongs to thee for aid or comfort, shall surely come through open or winding passages.
—Emerson.
The soul that can rise to the mountain tops and see the splendors of a greater day, may indeed rejoice with great joy; such a soul is not destined for an ordinary life; greater things are at hand; but they do not come to us; that which is greater does not come back to that which is lesser; we must press on into the life of the greater, and if we dream the dreams of great souls, those dreams will indicate that we can. We have gained the power; the gates are ajar; in the beautiful somewhere our own is waiting.
—C. D. Larson.
We should cease resisting conditions and agree with our adversary quickly. Freedom, liberty and happiness are not things of the external world; they come from within, and we are sad or happy, bound or free—not by our external, but by our internal conditions.
—Julia Seton Sears, M.D.
A little time consecrated to aspiration and prayer exalts and transforms the entire day and all its train of events.
—Lilian Whiting.
This beautiful Invisible Presence all about us and within us is the substance of every good which we can possibly desire. Aye, infinitely more than we are capable of desiring, for “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.”
—H. Emilie Cody.
We must regard ourselves as instruments and channels of the Divine action; even in a few things we must be good and faithful servants, and it is our privilege to help now in the conscious evolution and development of a higher life on this planet.
—Sir Oliver Lodge.
Until we are free from all anxiety regarding any matter we are not master of it.
—Katharine H. Newcomb.
One can rise to any heaven he himself chooses; and when he chooses so to rise, all the higher powers of the universe combine to help him heavenward.
—Ralph Waldo Trine.
The wise and advanced souls of the race waste no time in complaining about conditions, or obstacles, or barriers. They fret not against “wind, nor time, nor sea.” They “rave no more ‘gainst time and fate,” for each soul knows, verily, that ” Lo! My own shall come to me.” They know that everything has its place and purpose—that there is no such thing as chance—that nothing ever merely “happens”—that everything is working under law and order—that all is well with the world. They know that each of us is in just the place best fitted for his needs at this moment— that none will be kept in a position one moment longer than is necessary under the universal law— that ultimate justice reigns—in the end all will be seen to have been done in the very best manner, and at the very best time—done in the very best way. To those who are able to enter into this inner chamber of knowledge there comes indeed a “peace that passeth all understanding”; a hearing of harmonies undreamed of before—the voice of the soul singing its paeans of joy; a sight never imagined in the highest dreams—the glimpse of the inner light; a knowledge never before experienced—the knowing of the infinite supply and one’s relation to it. And this is why such a soul cries aloud from sheer joy! Lo! lo! My own shall come to me! I cannot escape my own good!
—Ralph B. Dysart.
To live always in the Secret Places of the Most
High,
To think only those thoughts that are inspired
from above,
To do all things in the conviction that God is with
us,
To give the best to all the world with no thought
of reward,
To leave all recompense to Him who doeth all
things well,
To love everybody as God loves us, and to be Kind
as He is Kind,
To ask God for everything and in faith expect
everything,
To live in perpetual gratitude to Him who gives
everything,
To love God so much that we can inwardly feel
that My Father and I are one—
This is the prayer without ceasing, the true worship of the soul.
—C. D. Larson.
The End