Through Silence to Realization or The Human Awakening E-Book

Floyd B. Wilson

• Herausgeber: Andura Publishing
• Kategorie: Ratgeber
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2020

Beschreibung

Experience the life-changing power of Floyd B. Wilson with this unforgettable book.

Leseprobe

Through Silence to Realization or The Human Awakening

Floyd B. Wilson

FOREWORD

I shall add nothing here in way of an apology for a new book on lines of practical metaphysics, or in way of suggestions, either as to unfolding powers within the human, or as to methods of bringing them to expression. The purpose of the volume is to help students to self-mastery; and I leave it to these seekers for truth to determine its right to be and endure.

FLOYD B. WILSON

New York, August, 1906

WHAT IS A THOUGHT?

The words idea and thought have often been classed as synonyms, and yet two or more ideas must be grouped or compared in order to fashion a thought. A study of the use of these words, as applied by some of our critical writers, will reveal the fact that thinkers who work out problems in the mental realm have seriously meditated on what must have passed through the mind of that philosopher who crystallized the result of certain mental researches into three words—”thoughts are things.” He must have recognized thoughts as entities that could, through suggestion, be implanted into consciousness, and vitalized there. He saw thought, a thing—a seed, with power to produce its kind.

Professor Elmer Gates promises soon to present to the world his discoveries in the art of mentation, as he has this volume nearly ready. He has explained to me many times his philosophy of the workings of the mind from sensation to thought. I give here only the crudest outline of it, for my purpose now is simply to explain the mental action necessary in order to produce a thought possessing generative power. Professor Gates calls sensation the primary starting point of all mental up-building to thought. The lowest forms of life, even amoebas, distinguish sensations of heat and cold. Now, sensation by touch doubtless gives a child his first idea of form. From two or more sensations a concept, a form, is conceived, and two or more concepts must be brought together to give one an image, and then two or more images are grouped to produce an idea, which is a conception formed by generalization. Attaining to ideas, the human mind, through comparison of at least two (often more) formulates a thought, which Sir William Hamilton defines as the faculty of relations or comparisons. Thought then evolves from sensation through the intellectual sway of human consciousness to a vital factor in mental evolution. Man’s development is shown by his individuality as that is built up by and through the thoughts he has formulated and implanted into consciousness during his life.

Lowell must have grasped the power and evolution of thought when he wrote:

“All thoughts that mould the age begin deep down within the primitive soul.”

And Shelly, in “Prometheus Unbound,” recognized the power of centralized thought in—

“As thought by thought is piled, till some great truth is loosened, And the nations echo round Shaken to their roots.”

In the thought-realm today, teachers everywhere are pressing upon the attention of the student the need of right thinking, for then only can suggestion carry to the fertile field of consciousness those thought seeds which generate and in due time bring forth the harvest of purpose fulfilled. In seeking the cause, after noting the effect, one is finally brought by traveling mentally backward to a suggestion, lodged in the mind often through strange and it may be mystic channels.

In a general way it has been recognized that the motive power of the world is the focused thought of its leaders. Thought is focused differently at different times; but sometimes leaders from several nations go through the same mental process, at the same time bringing their conclusions to the same general focus, and widespread development follows through that combined action. This might be illustrated by England’s act some years ago to wipe out slavery from all its colonies. Russia followed this a little later by the freeing of her serfs. At that time we were at war in this country to determine whether or not, under the constitution of the union formed, a state had the right of secession. With the waves of thought wafted from the old world, a new issue was presented; and then we learned that the bloody war was not being fought solely to determine the power of the union to coerce a state that wished to withdraw from the compact, but for the divine purpose of wiping out slavery from the earth forever.

A few years ago in this country there was a great political battle, the purpose of which was to determine whether or not there should be unlimited coinage of silver on the basis of sixteen to one. Throughout the length and breadth of our land, and throughout the civilized portion of the earth, to some extent, the press was filled with estimates made from the bank gold reserves known, as to whether or not there was gold enough in the world to make it the unit of value. The conflict ended with the party advocating the gold standard triumphant. Within the next year gold was discovered in divers localities throughout Colorado and other states that had been previously noted only as large silver producers. Within two years from that time the production of gold was so greatly increased that many of the advocates of free silver began to feel that an error had been made because the possibilities of the gold supply, even in this country, had been but vaguely known up to that date. In short, I claim that the discussion which arose in that campaign of 1896 awoke thought in the minds of intelligent men throughout the world; and, by the power of that awakening, vibrations from the infinite force were received, leading men to discover goldmines in localities that otherwise might never have been opened to the world.

To be personal in a way, let me say that when a student in college some thirty-five years ago, (it must be remembered going to Europe was then not as universal as it is today), I listened to lectures on history and language from professors who were familiar with Rome and Athens and the great European capitals. I regarded them almost with awe; because, in addition to their scholastic attainments, they had had such wide experience in travel. I read at that time Lord’s “Ancient Rome,” and became very enthusiastic over it. I longed to visit those scenes. I questioned if it might not be possible that I should do so. Today, as I take note of what has occurred in my life, I know I then sowed the thought seeds that took root in my subconscious mind. I entered the profession of law, and amid the duties of my work for several years I thought little of travel. Then, unsought, came a proposition that I visit Honduras in Central America in the interest of a New York syndicate. I closed the arrangement almost greedily, and started on my first foreign trip. Hardly had I returned from there than a proposition was made for me to visit London, Paris and Berlin. Since then I have crossed the Atlantic twenty times; and, with the exception of three of my trips, I have always gone forward in the interest of clients. I shrink sometimes in writing from being as personal as this; but, as I study the power of thought to generate in the subconscious mind and to produce the fruit one would, I can now understand how the seeds I sowed long years before, not recognizing the philosophy then, in good time gave forth their product, which brought me the desire of my heart.

It may seem to many of the readers of this paper that I have gone over-minutely into detail in placing before them the meaning of this simple word, thought. However, I have done this because as I go forward in the series of papers I am asked to write, over and over again I will need to refer to the power of thought, and I wish to give a clear idea of my understanding and particular use of the word. Man may discipline himself to control his own thoughts. These, properly fashioned and planted in his subconsciousness, will generate and grow. From time to time he may change the course of his thinking, and when he does this he will change his personality, ascending or descending according as he wills. How to master the thought machinery to meet one’s desire is not so difficult as it may appear to be to those unacquainted with true mental discipline. First, it is necessary to bring one’s self to a complete recognition of the mighty force which is developed by right thinking; and, second, having learned this, to sow the carefully culled thought seeds which by an inevitable law produce their kind, and the harvest will then always be the ripe, golden fruit of desire.

THE SILENCE

Since man has made a study of his mental powers he has found it necessary when troubled or annoyed to go where he could be alone, and there, as he has termed it, gather himself together again. Long before the metaphysics of today came into prominence, man had learned when exhausted and worried, that his best way to recuperate was to be alone. It was not a question of doing quiet thinking; it perhaps was not a question of thinking at all; and yet from these lonely musings he came forth renewed in strength and courage, ready again to battle with the world. With the Hindu, meditation is the path to power. He has studied unfoldment, as men in the West, with the hurry and rush of business, never thought of doing.

There are today in the various cities of the world, cults or societies which call their members together daily at a certain hour for silence. There each holds in his mind the desire of his heart, or the desire to aid someone in a particular way, or holds himself absolutely passive that he as an instrument may receive or give, as the Universal wills. These societies report the steady and continuous unfoldment of their members, unfoldment to attain happiness, unfoldment to advance mental growth, unfoldment to understand, step by step, more and more of what human life may mean.

As years go by and students in the West are learning of the powers that may be awakened by silence, the possibilities of man are becoming more apparent, until all intelligence is now declaring that limitations to him are inconceivable. Little by little men are learning in the West that silence, which is the hall of learning to the Hindu, is indeed the hall of learning to all mankind. The great question with which, the undisciplined are wrestling is how to find the silence, when and how to come to it, and more than all, how to enter it in faith. I will not attempt in this paper to present any argument as to why the silence can properly be called the hall of learning, or why the greatest unfoldment the human can ever know must be developed in the silence. I assume that this is conceded, and come forward with the broad statement that to silence man must come in order that he may unfold the higher consciousness within him. Assuming this statement to be true, and assuring my readers that I have proved it true over and over again, both in my own investigations, and by comparison with others who have followed similar lines of work, I now come to the real purpose of this paper, which is to suggest how to go into the silence and permit the Universal to act in order that unfoldment which will fill the heart’s desire may follow.

The first thing for the student to learn is the path to the silence. He may think he enters the silence long before he does. He is on the path simply till attainment begins, and attainment does not begin until points of vantage are reached.

It has been a custom for years with some of the Hindus who desire to attain a certain kind of power which belongs to the juggler, rather than to the adept, to take a position, holding the arm directly up, it may be, until it becomes paralyzed and he cannot move it from that position. After accomplishing this, although he has made himself a deformity, he finds he has gained certain mental control, which he uses to astonish or entertain the multitude. From this one may learn, although he may not care to develop in that direction at all, that even by such abnormal practices a mental development is reached, and mind has exercised its power over muscles until certain of them become inactive and inoperative. When this is done a mental growth follows of a character, which from my point of view, I regard very questionable and most undesirable; and yet it is to be observed that power is gained.

Now, in all the work which I have done, or suggested others doing, I claim that the starting point is stillness—physical stillness. In one of my papers in “Paths to Power” I gave specific directions as to sitting, and here it seems fitting to repeat some of them, adding, however, further suggestions. I have been told by many that they could not give an hour a day, or that they found it inconvenient to go in the same room and sit in the same chair, or that they found it impossible to sit still a whole hour, and then asked me what to do. All I can say to these people is this: I did not make the laws which, followed, bring to this higher development. I do not know that any one made them. If I find good ones practiced by the Hindus or by others, I may adopt them, modifying to some extent, it may be; and after using them as so modified, and having others use them and noting their acquisitions thereby, I know that I have found one way. There may be a thousand other ways that I know nothing about; but if I know one way, and place it before the student, and he finds it impossible to follow that way, all I can say is, seek some other if you care to unfold, perhaps you may find it. The path which leads to the silence may be found by devoting a particular time each day to going where one can be alone, sitting in a chair where he can sit erect and feel, in short, that the chair fits him. I request him not to lean back or rest his head at the commencement of the work. In that firm position let him learn to be still physically. Let his thoughts wander as they may; he should pay no attention to them. Later he will train them to do his bidding.

If at the commencement he finds it best to remain only fifteen or twenty minutes in that position, very well. Let him come to it again and again, making the sitting time a little longer each day. Then, after a week or several weeks’ practice, as the case may be, and after he has learned to sit still while erect for a whole hour, the real work will begin. I would then have him go to his sitting, taking the rigid position for about fifteen or twenty minutes, centralizing his thought upon what he desires. By that I mean he should draw a mental image of it and hold it before him. If it is an accomplishment which he has not, let him image himself as having already attained it and standing before people throwing out evidence of this fact. Let him then crystallize the description of that in some- short sentences, as “That is the ideal I seek,” “That is myself,” “I am thus and so,” for by these means he is adding to Hindu meditation the method presented by Jesus of praying as if already the blessing had been received.

When he has succeeded in making this image clear to his mental vision, and has found a few short words capable of being woven into a thought which stands for that image, then rigor should be succeeded by passiveness. Let the head rest on the back of the chair after filling the mind with these affirmations, and then relax. Still hold the mental gaze to the image, lifting the real self toward it till a merger is made. Then let one contemplate passively while in this position, his growth and continuing unfoldment, as he waits in the silence the gifts it may bring. As these are gathered one by one into possession, the student may penetrate, following the path deeper and deeper, till he enters the holy of holies in the halls of silence.

If one wants to master in a limited time a language, or any subject, he must secure a competent teacher and give the proper time to it. If he wishes to develop himself by methods which in the East have been known long, and which in the West are just beginning to be understood, he must find the time and go there in faith with purpose fixed, and work as all must work. The advanced students in modern psychology have learned that the Hindu taught a great metaphysical truth in regard to the development of man when he named the silence the hall of learning. I claim, however, that great advancement will be made while one is traveling on the path leading to the hall of silence. It will take weeks and months, and possibly years, of discipline to reach the inner chambers of the silence; and when one does, he there blends himself with the Universal, and he will then understand clearly his oneness with all life. THE DAWNING OF LIGHT.

All progression is noted to be a series of awakenings to the vastness of powers undeveloped, but yet resident within the unexplored regions of human intelligence. Wishings and longings are realized, one after another becoming actual possessions. From time to time a retrospect is taken as advanced planes of thought are reached, and comments are silently made by one’s objective consciousness as to the causes of advancement. As step by step forward has been taken, one will upon reflection observe that these steps have been made in spite of the doubts and fears and warnings of objective consciousness. The great background of one’s being, where from its vantage height the true selfhood looked out in the future beyond where the dull mental eyes of objective sensibility could pierce, was the station from which were hurled the godlike messages filled with soul longings. These had by thought been crystallized into formidable affirmations which contained within themselves creative spirit-substance. Upon their striking objective consciousness, it receded from its position of apparent conservatism for the moment, and the human became a god, vitalized by the mental shots fired from the subconscious and taking effect in the objective when it was passive or in slumber.

Mentally one notes the advance made, and objective consciousness firmly claims the honor and stoutly maintains, “I did it.” To argue with this timid duality of self would be only to delay progress. It is wiser to encourage that selfhood by compliment, firmly coupling this with the admonition that experience broaden it to delight in the victory won, and thus widen its horizon of view; for only thereby may the barriers of error be broken down between it and the batteries in the background of subconsciousness. From these batteries is sent the god-wisdom in the soul, which it continually and forever is drawing from the eternal supply.

Thus briefly do I analyze the mental process going on within each individual attaining advancement. It is not a question whether he has given the philosophy any thought or not. There is an eternal law to be fulfilled in each, and every act of his life; and if objectively he catches the whispers of heartfelt longings, let him know these can be heard only when the soul reservoir contains within itself the creative substance to make them outwardly manifest. How to draw from that reservoir is the problem which this age has solved. He who without conscious discipline may have attained desire, I argue, has been divinely led by the messengers of Infinity, because he opened the way in moments of passive unconsciousness. These people are called lucky, and they often wonder at their luck. I have talked with scores of them, directed their thought over the paths they have traversed, and in every case I have found the law being worked out through the inspirations given to the objective self by that mighty self which links man to Omnipotence. Happy are we in this age that we know the law. We can discipline thought to obey it, and we therefore can control that bugbear, fate, and work out our true destiny. This fact may be discovered by seriously noting, tabulating and recognizing our longings and desires, knowing they are throbbings from one consciousness to another that tell of the ideals which it is our privilege and duty to attain. How long it may take one to discipline himself to know these truths is a question each must answer for himself. It is as impossible for me to answer this question as it would be for me to tell anyone how long it would take him to commit a single act of any one of Shakespeare’s plays. In that case I could positively tell him that he could commit and memorize a whole act or a whole play of Shakespeare’s if he entered upon the work with a firm determination to accomplish it. As to the time it would take, much would depend upon the tasks he had previously given to memory to perform, and the true discipline he had given that function. .