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utter helpless- ness before the great iron wall of selfishness by which he is confronted. Both these attitudes of mind are the result of an incomplete knowledge of what constitutes selfishness. This partial knowledge dom- inates him because, although he has over- come the grosser forms of selfishness in himself, and is so far noble, he is yet selfish in other and more remote and subtle 28 ENTERING THE KINGDOM directions.

This feeling of helplessness is the prelude to one of two conditions: the man will either give up in despair and again sink himself in the selfishness of the world, or he will search and meditate until he finds another way out of the difficulty.

That way he will find. Look- ing more and more deeply into the things of life; reflecting, meditating, examin- ing, and analyzing; grappling every diffi- culty and problem with intensity of thought, and developing day by day a profounder love of Truth — by these means his heart will grow and his comprehension expand, until at last he realizes that the way to destroy selfishness is not to try to destroy one form of it in other people, but to destroy it utterly, root and branch, in himself.

The perception of this truth constitutes spiritual illumination, and when once it is awakened in the mind, the strait and narrow way is revealed, and the shining Gates of the Kingdom already loom in the distance. Then does a man apply COMPETITIVE LAWS AND LAW OF LOVE 29 to himself — not to others — these words: "And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye ?

Or how wilt thou say to thy brother, Let me pull out the mote out of thine eye; and, behold, a beam is in thine own eye ? Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye."

When a man can apply these words to himself and act upon them, judging himself mercilessly but judging none other, then will he rise above and render of no effect the laws of competition, and will find the higher Law of Love, subjecting him- self to which every evil thing will flee from him, and the joys and blessings that the selfish vainly seek will constantly wait upon him.

Not only this, having lifted himself, he will lift the world. By his example many will see the Way, and will walk it; and the powers of light shall be the stronger for his having lived. It will here be asked: "But will not a man who has risen above his selfishness, mm 30 ENTERING THE KINGDOM and therefore above the competitive strife, suffer through the selfishness and com- petition of those around him ?

Will he not, after all the trouble he has taken to purify himself, suffer at the hands of the impure ?" No; he will not. The equity of the Divine Order is perfect and cannot be subverted, so that it is im- possible for one who has overcome selfish- ness to be subject to the laws that are brought into operation by the action of selfishness: in other words, each indi- vidual suffers by virtue of his own selfishness.

It is true that all the selfish come under the operation of the competitive laws and suffer collectively, each acting more or less as the instrument by which the suffering of others is brought about, and that this makes it appear on the surface as though men suffered for the sins of others rather than their own.

But the truth is that in a uni- verse the very basis of which is harmony, which can only be sustained by the perfect adjustment of all its parts, each unit receives its own measure of adjustment, COMPETITIVE LAWS AND LAW OF LOVE 31 and suffers by and of itself.