Part 14

The Law will sometimes accomplish its results in ways far different from that which we would have supposed to be the best, but after time has passed we can look back and will see that the way by which the results were accomplished was the best possible under all the circumstances. We may meet with some bitter disappointments, losses, sorrows, but in the end these things will be seen as good--will be seen as having been necessary to give us the experience needed--to round out our characters--to enable us to understand.

There are none who would be willing to part with the experience gained from even the most painful events of their lives. After, say, ten years have elapsed no man would be willing to have the memory and recollection of his greatest pain eradicated; if at the same time he would have to part with the experience and knowledge which have come to him by reason of that pain. The pain and its resulting experience have become a part of us, and we are not willing to be robbed of our own.

And we will realize, in looking backward, that if we had been living in accordance with the Law in the past--if we had understood its workings--these very sorrows, disappointments, losses, would have been considered only in view of their ultimate good, and the very sting of the pain would thus have been removed. When we learn to regard the pain of to-day as we now do the pain of ten years ago, we may feel that we are beginning to understand something of the operation of the Law of Good. And when we reach this stage, we will find that the pain is no longer pain, but only a form of Good. When we cease to cause friction, friction no longer exists for us.

The lessons of life must be learned, sooner or later. It depends upon us whether they shall be forced upon us, in spite of our resistance, with much pain, or accepted by us, understandingly, with knowledge. In one case we will have the pain which comes from opposing the Law; in the other, we will learn the lesson equally well, without the pain of the birching. The lesson must be well learned in either case. Choose your method.

Now, I do not wish to be understood as meaning that we should simply fold our hands and wait for the Law to bring all things to us without any labor on our part. Try this way, though, if you like, and see how quickly the Law will rap you over the knuckles to remind you that a task is set before you. The proper way is to take up the task that lies nearest your hand (and some task is always there) and do it well, with the knowledge that the task has been placed there in accordance with the Law. If the task is not to your liking, you will know that that is the very reason that it has been placed before you--you have a lesson to learn from it. When the time comes for a change you will find a strong desire for a something else full-grown within you. Now is your chance. Trust to the Law to aid you in working out your desire. The desire is there in accordance with the Law--its very existence is a promise of its fulfillment. With the aid of the Law you will work out your desire. It is true that when you attain the object of your desire, it may not be just what you had thought it--may not be at all what you want. Well, what of that? You have learned the necessary lesson--have lived out the desire and will now outlive it. Something else will take its place. And you will be surprised at the way that Law has brought about the accomplishment of your desire. You will learn another lesson in this.

When you have learned to work on, merrily--doing your best--living out each day's life--with Faith and Trust, Confidence and Fearlessness--accepting the development of each day as meaning ultimate Good--seeing and feeling that the Law of Good is in full operation--being willing to accept whatever it may bring you--then, and not until then, good friend, will you begin to know what is LIFE.

LET US HAVE FAITH.

Faith necessary in every human undertaking--You have faith in man, but are afraid to trust GOD--The Universe if governed by Law--The Law is in operation everywhere--Don't be afraid--You are a part of the plan--Fall in with the Law--Have faith, have faith.

When you take a journey by rail, you step into the car, settle yourself, take out a book and read, and give little or no thought to the engine or engineer in charge of the train. You go rushing across the country at the rate of fifty miles an hour, with no thought of possible disaster or accident, and for the time forgetting that there is such a person in existence as the engineer. You have absolute faith in the careful management of the road, and in the intelligence of the man who has been placed in the engine. The lives of yourself and hundreds of fellow passengers are practically in the hands of one man, and that man is a stranger to you--you have never seen him--you know nothing of his qualifications--you only know that the management has picked him out to safely conduct you across the country.

You take a steamship to Europe and place yourselves in the hands of a few men who are total strangers to you. You stake your life on their skill, judgment and intelligence. You feel that they would not be where they are unless the management of the line considered them competent. It is all a matter of trust--of confidence. The same thing is true when you take your seat on a trolley car or on the elevated railroad, or even in a stage coach or a private carriage. In each case you place yourself in the charge of another person in whom you have a certain amount of confidence, although he may be comparatively, or wholly, unknown to you.

You place your wealth in a bank, having confidence in its management. You have business dealings with men whom you scarcely know, trusting to their honesty of purpose. In every transaction in life you are compelled to have confidence in people. Your lawyer, your physician, your grocer, your clerks are all taken on faith. One cannot get away from it. If confidence were destroyed the wheels of modern life would stop in a minute. The so-called hard-headed practical man may sneer at Faith, but it underlies every manifestation of the life of this civilization.

Man has faith and confidence in Man, but is afraid to trust GOD. He looks about him and sees millions of worlds, each in its appointed place, each revolving in its own orbit. He has faith that at a certain time each world will be in a certain position, which position may be calculated centuries in advance--but he lacks faith in the Power that created these worlds and keeps them in their places. He has faith in certain Laws--but he doubts the existence of the Law-maker. He sees the wondrous manifestation of Life in great and small. He takes advantage of the telescope and the microscope and explores new regions, and finds the Law in operation everywhere--but he doubts the existence of a great Law which governs his life--his incomings and his outgoings--his great deeds and his petty acts--he fails to realize the truth of the saying that the hairs on his head are numbered, and that not a sparrow may fall unnoticed.

He seems to think that if there is a GOD, he must have made the world and then ran away and left it to take care of itself. He fails to see that Law must govern Man's life as it governs the unfolding of the leaf, the development of the lily. He fails to see that law is in full operation within him as well as without him. He fails to see that as he opposes the operation of Law, pain comes by reason of the friction. He fails to see that the only true philosophy is that which teaches one to fall in with the operations of Law, and to let it work in him and through him.

Do you think for a moment that GOD does not know what he is about? Do you doubt the Supreme Intelligence which knows all things and is conscious of all things? Do you doubt the Supreme Power which manifests itself in all forms of power? Do you doubt the Universal Presence which is in all places at all times? Do you suppose that the manifestation is everything, and the manifestor nothing? Poor man!

Either the Universe is without Law--without meaning--without reason, or it is the manifestation of Supreme and Infinite Reason. Either it is the work of a Demon who sits somewhere and grins and gloats over our misfortunes--our trials--our troubles--our pain--our follies, or it is the work of an All-knowing--All-powerful--All-present Intelligence-Power-Presence which has taken into consideration everything within the Universe, down to the tiniest thing--down to the merest detail. And if this last be true, then everything that happens must be in accordance with Law--everything that happens to us must be the very best thing that could happen to us at that particular time and that particular place.

Things are not run by blind chance--there is Law under everything. Everything has some connection with every other thing--every person has a relationship with every other person. All is One--the manifestations are varied, but there is but One reality. There is a great plan underlying all Life, and Life itself is in accordance with that plan. Nothing ever happens. Every occurrence has a bearing on every other occurrence. Chance has no part in the plan--everything is in accord with well ordered laws. There is always an end in view in every thought, word or act. We are constantly being used for the benefit of the whole. There is no escape--and when we get to know we cease to wish to escape. He who understands not Law is constantly struggling, striving, fighting and contending against it, and, producing friction, he feels pain. He who understands something of Law ceases to contend against it--he lets it work through him, and is carried along with a mighty force, doing each day the best he knows how, expressing himself in the best possible manner, sailing to the right and to the left, with the wind and against the wind, but still being borne on by the mighty current and resisting it not. He enjoys every mile of the journey, seeing new sights and hearing new sounds--moving on ever. He who understands not, rebels at being swept along--he wishes to stay where he is, but there is no such thing as staying--life is motion--life is growth. If you prefer to pull against the tide--to row up stream--by all means do so. After a while you will grow tired and weary, and will rest on your oars. Then you will find that you are moving on just the same toward the unknown seas, and you will find that it is much easier work rowing or sailing with the current, or from one side of the river to another, than to attempt to stay in the same place or to pull up the stream.

All this fretting--all this worrying--all this contention and strife, comes from a lack of Faith. We may assert fervently that we know that All is Good, and that all is best for us, etc., etc., but have we enough faith to manifest it in our lives? See how we endeavor to tie on to things, people, and environments. How we resist the steady pressure that is tearing us loose, often with pain, from the places to which we have wished to stay fastened like a barnacle. The Life force is back of us, urging us along--pushing us along--and move we must. The process of growth, development and unfoldment is going on steadily. What's the use of attempting to resist it? You are no more than a water-bug on the surface of the river. You may dart here and there, and apparently are running things to suit yourself without reference to the current, but all the time you are moving along with it. The water-bug plan is all right, just so long as we do not attempt to stop the current or to swim right against it--when we try this we find out very quickly that the current has something to say about it, and before long we get so tired that we are willing to fall in with the law behind the current. And yet even the opposition is good, for it teaches us that the current is there--we gain by experience. The New Thought does not teach people to stem the current or to swim up stream, although some teachers and some students seem to be of that opinion. On the contrary, the real New Thought teaches us of the existence of the stream, and that it is moving steadily toward the Sea of Good. It teaches us how to fall in with it, and be borne further along, instead of attempting to hold back and become barnacles, or to try to push back up the stream. It also teaches us to live in the Now--to enjoy the darting backward and forward over the face of the waters. It also tells us of the direction in which the current is moving, that we may move along that way, without wasting our energies in trying to go the other. It teaches us co-operation with Law, instead of opposition to it.

Why do we not have Faith? Why do we not see the great Plan behind it all? Why do we not recognize Law? As we have seen, we place our confidence in the engineer of the train--the pilot--the captain--the coach-driver, and the other guiding hands and yet we hesitate to trust ourselves in the hands of the Infinite. Of course, it makes no difference to the Infinite whether or not we repose trust in it. It moves along just the same, guiding and directing--steering and regulating speed--it minds not our doubts and obstructions any more than does the great driving-wheel mind the fly who is perched upon it and who does not like the movement and attempts to stop it by spreading out its wings and buzzing. The great wheel of the Universe is moving around, steadily and mightily. Let us go with it. And while we are going let us spare ourselves the trouble and folly of the buzzing, wing-spreading business.

Let us part with Fear and Worry. Let us cease our imagining that we can run the Universe better than the engineer who has his hand on the throttle. Let us cease imagining that GOD needs advice on the subject. Let us stop this folly of saying "Poor God, with no one to help him run things." Let us trust the engineer. Let us have faith--let us have faith.

DO IT NOW.

Do to-day's tasks now--Don't try to do to-morrow's work to-day, but be sure and do the day's work Now--The baneful effects of procrastination--Not fair to yourself--Demoralization attendant upon putting off things--The world looking for people who can do things Now.

If you have anything to do--do it. If you have any task to perform to-day--do it Now. If the matter cannot possibly be performed to-day, stop bothering about it, and get to work doing the things of to-day. But don't get into that miserable habit of putting off things until later in the day, or later in the week--do them now. The old proverb: "Procrastination is the thief of time," is true, but it does not go far enough. Procrastination is not only the thief of time, but the thief of energy--the thief of efficiency--the thief of success.

We have had much to say about living in the Now--about not dwelling in the past or fretting about the future. And all this is true, and I will probably say it over and over again during the year, because I believe in it, and wish you to get acquainted with the idea. But living in the Now does not merely mean the thinking of the thoughts of to-day--the carrying of the burdens of to-day--the meeting of the problems of to-day. It also means the doing of the WORK of to-day.

To attempt to carry last year's burdens--or next week's burdens--to-day, is folly of the worst kind, as you well know. But it is equally foolish to put off to-day's work until to-morrow. It's not treating to-morrow right--not giving it a chance. The Self of to-morrow is not exactly the Self of to-day. That is, it has grown a little and is the Self of to-day plus the added experience of the day. And it is just as selfish for the Self of to-day to attempt to throw his burdens upon the Self of to-morrow as it would be for you to attempt to throw your burdens upon your brother or sister. It is not only selfish, but it is hurtful to you--it impedes your growth. To-day's work is set before you because of the lesson it contains, and if you refuse to accept your lesson, you are the loser. You cannot get away from the task. It will be placed before you again and again until it is performed, and you might as well do it at once, and get your lesson at the proper time, and not be compelled like the schoolboy to "catch-up" in his work. By putting off things until to-morrow, you are simply heaping up troubles for yourself to-morrow, as to-morrow's own work will have to be done as well as your leftover tasks, and the chances are that neither of them will be done properly. There's no sense whatever in this habit of procrastinating. It is folly of the worst kind.

And not only in the immediate effects is procrastination hurtful to one. One of the worst features of the case is the demoralizing effect it has upon the whole mental attitude of the man. It cultivates laziness, indecision, shiftlessness, slackness and many other undesirable habits of thought and action. It manifests itself in numberless ways in the character of the man who has allowed himself to be tangled in it. It impairs his efficiency--affects his value.

Then again, you are really unfair to yourself if you get in the way of putting off things. You never have any time to yourself if you have a number of old matters demanding your attention. The man who procrastinates is never able to spare time for mental improvement, because he always has some old loose ends to wind up--some old tangle to straighten out. And he loses all idea of the value of time--of getting the most out of every hour, every minute. The procrastinator is the veriest drudge--he has his nose to the grindstone all the time. He never has any time he can call his own. He is a slave to his own habit of "laying things aside." Poor man.

I am satisfied that half the failures of life--yes, three-quarters of them--are due to the failure of persons to do the thing Now. Not only because of what they lose directly by this habit, but because of the effect it produces upon their character. The shiftless habit of thought manifests itself in action. The thought and action, long persisted in, will lead to a demoralization of the entire character of the individual. He soon forgets how to do things right. And that is where so many people fail. The world is looking for people who can DO things--and who can Do Them Now.

If you are one of the procrastinating kind, start in at once and get over it. Put up a sign before your desk, your sewing machine, your work-bench, or wherever you spend most of your time, and have these words in big black letters on the sign:--"DO IT NOW!" By carrying the thought of this NOW way of doing things, and letting it manifest itself in action as frequently as possible, you will find that before long your entire mental attitude regarding work has changed, and you will find yourself doing things when they should be done, without any particular effort on your part. The mind can be trained and taught to do things right. It needs a little courage, a little perseverance, a little will-power, but the result will pay you for your trouble. Start in to cure yourself of this bad habit. Start in at once. Do it NOW.