XXII MIND AND HAND
I HAVE before me a curious piece of ancient Egyptian symbolism. It represents the sun sending down to the earth innumerable rays, with the peculiarity that each ray terminates in a hand. This method of representing the sun is so unusual that it suggests the presence in the designer's mind of some idea rather different from those generally associated with the sun as a spiritual emblem; and, if I interpret the symbol rightly, it sets forth the truth, not only of the Divine Being as the Great Source of all Life and of all Illumination, but also the correlative truth of our individual relation to that centre. Each ray is terminated by a hand, and a hand is the emblem of active working; and I think it would be difficult to give a better symbolical representation of innumerable individualities, each working separately, yet all deriving their activity from a common source. The hand is at work upon the earth, and the sun, from which it is a ray, is shining in the heavens; but the connecting line shows whence all the strength and skill of the hand are derived.
If we look at the microcosm of our own person we
doing, and the other the consciousness or perception of being. If we realise only one of these two centres we shall lose both mental and moral balance. If we lose sight of that centre which is our personal will, we shall become flabby visionaries without any backbone; and if, in our anxiety to develop backbone, we lost sight of the other centre, we shall find that we have lost that which corresponds to the lungs and heart in the physical body, and that our backbone, however perfectly developed, is rapidly drying
ad infinitum, and which thus enables us to give out to any extent we please. But for wise and effective giving out a strong and enlightened will is an absolute necessity, and therefore we do well to cultivate the will, or the active side of our nature. But we must equally cultivate the receptive side also; and when we do this rightly by seeing in the Infinite Mind the one source of supply, our will-power becomes intensified by the knowledge that the whole power of the Infinite is present to back it up; and with this continual sense of Infinite Power behind us we can go calmly and steadily
1902.
