A man does not live until he begins to discipline himself;
he merely exists. Like an animal he gratifies his desires
and pursues his inclinations just where they may lead him.
He is happy as a beast is happy, because he is not conscious
of what he is depriving himself; he suffers as the beast
suffers, because he does not know the way out of suffering.
He does not intelligently reflect upon life, and lives in a
series of sensations, longings, and confused memories which
are unrelated to any central idea or principle. A man whose
inner life is so ungoverned and chaotic must necessarily
manifest this confusion in the visible conditions of his
outer life in the world; and though for a time, running with
the stream of his desires, he may draw to himself a more or
less large share of the outer necessities and comforts of
life, he never achieves any real success nor accomplishes
any real good, and sooner or later wordly failure and
disaster are inevitable, as the direct result of the inward
failure to properly adjust and regulate those mental forces
which make the outer life.
Before a man accomplish anything of an enduring nature in
the world he must first of all acquire some measure of
success in the management of his own mind. This is as
mathematical a truism as that two and two are four, for,
“out of the heart are the issues of life.” If a man cannot
govern the forces within himself, he cannot hold a firm
hand upon the outer activities which form his visible life.
On the other hand, as a man succeeds, in governing himself
he rises to higher and higher levels of power and usefulness
and success in the world. The only difference between the
life of the beast and that of the undisciplined man is that
the man has a wider variety of desires, and experiences a
greater intensity of suffering. It may be said of such a man
that he is dead, being truly dead to self-control, chastity,
fortitude, and all the nobler qualities which constitute
life. In the consciousness of such a man the crucified Christ
ies entombed, awaiting that resurrection which shall revivify
the mortal sufferer, and wake him up to a knowledge of tha
realities of his existence.
With the practice of self-discipline a man begins to live,
for he then commences to rise above the inward confusion
and to adjust his conduct to a steadfast centre within
himself. He ceases to follow where inclination leads him,
reins in the steed of his desires, and lives in accordance
with the dictates of reason and wisdom. Hitherto his life
has been without purpose or meaning, but now he begins to
consciously mould his own destiny; he is “clothed and in
his right mind.”
In the process of self-discipline there are three stages
namely;
1. Control
2. Purification
3. Relinquishment
A man begins to discipline himself by controlling those
passions which have hitherto controlled him; he resists
temptation and guards himself against all those tendencies
to selfish gratifications which are so easy and natural,
and which have formerly dominated him. He brings his
appetite into subjection, and begins to eat as a reasonable
and responsible being, practising moderation and
thoughtfulness in the selection of his food, with the
object of making his body a pure instrument through which
he may live and act as becomes a man, and no longer
degrading that body by pandering to gustatory pleasure. He
puts a check upon his tongue, his temper, and, in fact, his
every animal desire and tendency, and this he does by
referring all his acts to a fixed centre within himself.
It is a process of living from within outward, instead of,
as formerly, from without inward. He conceives of an ideal,
and, enshrining that ideal in the sacred recesses of his
heart, he regulates his conduct in accordance with its
exaction and demands.
There is a philosophical hypothesis that at the heart of
every atom and every aggregation of atoms in the universe
there is a motionless center which is the sustaining source
of all the universal activities. Be this as it may, there
is certainly in the heart of every man and woman a selfless
centre without which the outer man could not be, and the
ignoring of which leads to suffering and confusion. This
selfless center which takes the form, in the mind, of an
ideal of unselfishness and spotless purity, the attainment
of which is desirable, is man’s eternal refuge from the
storms of passion and all the conflicting elements of his
lower nature. It is the Rock of Ages, the Christ within,
the divine and immortal in all men.
End of part 1. Part 2 coming soon…
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