Chapter XVIII (part 4)

A man whose moral sense prompts him to overcome passion in himself, does so because the moral sense (i.e., emotion) is more powerful than all his other feelings, other emotions. In substance p. 218 all this is perfectly clear and simple, but it has become confused and confusing simply because men, calling different degrees of one and the same thing by diverse names, began to see fundamental differences where there were only differences in degree . Will is the resultant of desires. We call that man strong-willed in whom the will proceeds on definite lines, without turning aside; and we call that man weak-willed in whom the line of the will takes a zig-zag course, turning aside here or there under the influence of every new desire. But this does not mean that will and desire are something opposite; quite the reverse, they are one and the same, because the will is composed of desires. Reason cannot conquer feeling, because feeling can be conquered only by feeling. Reason can only give thoughts and pictures, evoking feelings which will conquer the feeling of a given moment. Spirituality is not opposed to "intellectuality" or "emotionality." It is only THEIR HIGHER FLIGHT. Reason has no limits: only the human, "Euclidian" mind, the mind devoid of emotions, is limited. But what is "reason?" It is the inner aspect of any given being. In the earth's animal kingdom, in all animals lower than man, we see passive reason . But with the appearance of concepts it becomes active, and part of it begins to work as intellect. The animal is conscious through his sensation and emotions. The intellect is present in the animal only in an embryonic state, as an emotion of curiosity , a pleasure of knowing. In man the growth of consciousness consists in the growth of the intellect and the accompanying growth of the higher emotions—esthetic, religious, moral—which according to the measures of their growth become more and more intellectualized , while simultaneously with this the intellect is assimilating emotionality, ceasing to be "cold." . Thus "spirituality" is a fusion of the intellect with the higher emotions. The intellect is spiritualized from the emotions; the emotions are spiritualized from the intellect. The functions of the rational faculty are not limited, but not often does the human intellect rise to its highest form. At the same time it is incorrect to say that the highest form of human knowledge will not be intellectual, but of a different character; only this higher p. 219 reason is entirely unrestricted by logical concepts and by Euclidian modes of thought. We are likely to hear a great deal concerning this from the standpoint of mathematics , which as a matter of fact transcended the reasoning of logic long ago. But it achieved this by the aid of the intellect . A new order of receptivity grows in the soil of the intellect and of the higher emotions, but it is not created by them. A tree grows in the earth, but it is not created by the earth. A seed is necessary. This seed may be in the soul, or absent from it. When it is there it can be cultivated or it can be choked; when it is not there it is impossible to replace it with anything else. The soul (if a soul it may be called) lacking that seed, i.e., inept to feel and reflect the world of the wondrous, will never put forth the living sprout, but will always reflect the phenomenal world, and that alone. At the present stage of his development man comprehends many things by means of his intellect, but at the same time, he comprehends many things by means of his emotions. In no case are emotions merely organs of feeling for feeling's sake : they are all organs of knowledge. In every emotion man knows something that he could not know without its aid—something that he could know by no other emotion, by no effort of the intellect.