The Mystic Will | Page 7

see so many abuses or
errors in them. But to know and do what is right, when understood, is
recognising God as nearly as man can know him, and to do this
perfectly we require Will. It is the true Logos.

CHAPTER I.
ATTENTION AND INTEREST.
"To the fairies, Determination and Good-Will, all things are
possible."--The Man of the Family, by C. REID.
It happened recently to me, as I write, to see one afternoon lying on the
side walk in the Via Calzaioli in Florence what I thought was a
common iron screw, about three inches in length, which looked as if it
had been dropped by some workman. And recalling the superstition
that it is lucky to find such an object, or a nail, I picked it up, when to
my astonishment I found that it was a silver pencil case, but made to
exactly resemble a screw. Hundreds of people had, perhaps, seen it,
thought they knew all about it, or what it was, and then passed it by,
little suspecting its real value.
There is an exact spiritual parallel for this incident or parable of the
screw-pencil in innumerable ideas, at which well-nigh everybody in the
hurrying stream of life has glanced, yet no one has ever examined, until
someone with a poetic spirit of curiosity, or inspired by quaint
superstition, pauses, picks one up, looks into it, and finds that It has
ingenious use, and is far more than it appeared to be. Thus, if I declare
that by special attention to a subject, earnestly turning it over and
thinking deeply into it, very remarkable results may be produced, as
regards result in knowledge, every human being will assent to it as the
veriest truism ever uttered; in the fullest belief that he or she assuredly
knows all that.
Yet it was not until within a very few years that I discovered that this
idea, which seemed so commonplace, had within it mysteries and
meanings which were stupendously original or remarkable. I found that
there was a certain intensity or power of attention, far surpassing
ordinary observation, which we may, if we will, summon up and force
on ourselves, just as we can by special effort see or hear far better at
times than usually. The Romans show by such a phrase as animum
adjicere, and numerous proverbs and synonyms, that they had learned

to bend their attention energetically. They were good listeners,
therefore keen observers.
Learning to control or strengthen the Will is closely allied to
developing Attention and Interest, and for reasons which will soon be
apparent, I will first consider the latter, since they constitute a
preparation or basis for the former. And as preliminary, I will consider
the popular or common error to the effect that everyone has alloted to
him or to her just so much of the faculty of attention or interest as it has
pleased Nature to give--the same being true as regards Memory, Will,
the Constructive or Artistic abilities, and so on--when in very truth and
on the warrant of Experience all may be increased ad infinitum.
Therefore, we find ignorant men complacently explaining their
indifference to art and literature or culture on the ground that they take
no interest in such subjects, as if interest were a special heaven-sent gift.
Who has not heard the remark, "He or she takes such an interest in so
many things--I wish that I could." Or, as I heard it very recently
expressed, "It must be delightful to be able to interest one's self in
something at any time." Which was much the same as the expression of
the Pennsylvania German girl, "Ach Gott! I wisht I hat genius und
could make a pudden!"
No one can be expected to take an interest at once and by mere will in
any subject, but where an earnest and serious Attention has been
directed to it, Interest soon follows. Hence it comes that those who
deliberately train themselves in Society after the precept enforced by all
great writers of social maxims to listen politely and patiently, are
invariably rewarded by acquiring at last shrewd intelligence, as is well
known to diplomatists. That mere stolid patience subdues impatience
sounds like a dull common-place saying, but it is a silver pencil
disguised as an iron screw; there is a deep subtlety hidden in it, if it be
allowed with a little intelligence, forethought, and determination
towards a purpose. Let us now consider the mechanical and easy
processes by which attention may be awakened.
According to ED. VON HARTMANN, Attention is either spontaneous
or reflex. The voluntary fixing our mind upon, or choosing an idea,

image, or subject, is spontaneous attention, but when the idea for some
reason impresses itself upon us then we have enforced, or reflex