THE SEVEN PURPOSES


      Chapter XI

      ON the evening of his arrival, May 7th, Mr.
      Kendal asked his wife whether she could stay
      with us during his visit to New York, and
      she replied that she would outstay him, unless
      the forces attacking me were defeated before
      his departure.

      "It really helps, then, for us to get together
      here," he inferred.

      "Yes, indeed, it helps. All combination of
      force adds by the sum of its participation to
      the original amount of force combined."

      Taken in conjunction with other, similar
      assertions in this connection—"Its force is freed
      and multiplied by the sum of your participa-
      tion"; "For every vibration of pure construc-
      tive purpose among the Allied forces, we have
      added two"; "Force united is more powerful
      by half than similar forces separately striving";
      etc.—it seems probable that these expressions
      were intended as figures of speech, emphasizing
      the increased potency of united purpose on our
      plane and the ability of the free forces to rein-
      force it in proportion to its actual vitality, [276]
      rather than as mathematical statements of the
      exact degree to which this reinforcement and
      co-operation may be carried.

      Mentioning that sometimes they seemed to
      make a distinction between purpose and force,
      and again to use the terms interchangeably,
      Mr. Kendal said he would like to know the
      character of each. "Is purpose like the di-
      rection of an electric current, and force like
      amperage and voltage?" he asked. "Or is
      purpose the road, and force the velocity in fol-
      lowing it? Is purpose qualitative, and force
      quantitative? Is the distinction between them
      along some of these lines?"

      "It is along all those lines," was the reply.
      "Purpose is the force that draws. Force is the
      purpose that pushes."

      Like various others to whom these messages
      first came through me, Mr. Kendal had been
      trying, with some success, to obtain direct
      communication. Mary facetiously described
      his pencil as "a good burro," and mine as "a
      real hawse." I had thought this dialecticism
      differently spelled, but he reminded me that
      "hoss" belonged to New England, and
      "hawse" to Mary's native state, Kentucky.

      While the pencil-point rested idly on the
      paper, we talked about the sensations accom-
      panying its movement, and about the probable [277]
      direction of the force propelling it. To him,
      the impulse seemed to come first and chiefly
      through the consciousness; to me, it seemed
      a physical force externally applied to the
      pencil, notwithstanding occasional conscious-
      ness of what the message would be; but we
      were agreed that it was difficult, at first, to
      be sure that the impulse was not in some un-
      recognized way our own.

      "It has been amusing to us to see you two
      struggle against our psychical intrusions,"
      Mary remarked, at this point. "We do push
      the pencil. We also reach the mind. Some-
      times the one, sometimes the other, is what
      does the trick. It is easier for us to impress
      the mind, but harder for you to recognize that
      suggestion as ours. You think it's your own,
      and fight. . Margaret is even more resistant
      than Manzie—perhaps because she has more
      responsibility to other people."

      "Are present conditions—the gathering of
      the clans for the coming struggle—going to
      enable many people to do this, who have never
      done it before and otherwise would have been
      unable to do it?" he asked.

      "Yes; but the danger of that is that the
      other forces will find their own channels, and
      steal and defile some of ours. So we can't
      advise people to experiment, unless they can [278]
      absolutely identify the force here, and only a
      few, comparatively, can do that."

      He said that he had hesitated to ask ques-
      tions of his own pencil, being unwilling to go
      too far in this until he had checked it up
      through me.

      "He's scairt," she teased, before he had fair-
      ly started to speak. "You don't trust your-
      self or me."

      Laughing, he retorted: "That's another!"

      "You are right to be careful," she went on,
      serious again. "It's a dangerous adventure,
      unless you keep your balance, follow your own
      purpose, keep close tab on the force handling
      the pencil, and lean on it only spiritually. The
      minute advice in material things is sought,
      that minute there is danger."

      "There's no danger that anybody can im-
      personate you and fool me," he declared.

      "Never! The danger is that somebody
      might lie to you about me; or if you cease to
      stand on your own feet and make your own
      choice in matters of your plane, only then
      somebody might impersonate me for a moment.
      Sometimes I can tell you those things, but the
      habit of depending on them is bad for you."

      A night or two later, beginning with a reply
      to a question concerning another subject, she
      returned to the discussion of the force used [279]
      in conveying these communications—"a force
      compared to which electricity is like spring
      water," she said—declaring, like Frederick,
      that its explanation is still impossible in terms
      of our plane.

      "There is a vital and potent force, not yet
      isolated—and hardly discovered—by your most
      advanced scientists," she told us. "It has
      characteristics and attractions not explainable
      until its discovery and analysis give rise to a
      new set of words. There is no adequate
      comparison that may be used to indicate its
      force, or the conditions and degrees of its
      variations. It has some resemblance to elec-
      tricity, yet the comparison in certain cases
      would be misleading."

      "I am talking about the force we use in
      moving this pencil, and to some extent in
      affecting your thought," she continued, when
      Mr. Kendal had mentioned certain recent
      scientific experiments of which he had read.
      "The scientists have long associated the power
      of thought with the brain, and have seriously
      argued that, as we could not be seen, measured,
      weighed, or condensed, we did not exist. We
      do. And we have a force at our command
      that cannot be explained, as yet. It can only
      occasionally be demonstrated as clearly as
      this. Electricity is the most likely to impress [280]
      the man in the street as a comparison, but to
      argue from that as a premise would lead to
      misconception. At present, it must be ac-
      cepted as a recognized but not understood
      force, only dimly perceived, as for years
      electricity was."

      "Does it help, if we emphasize what we know
      of static electricity, as well as thinking of the
      comparison in terms of electric current? A
      static force in your plane, perhaps?"

      "Yes, that helps; but the static force is in
      your plane, quite as much as here. We have
      more knowledge of the current, to continue
      the simile, but encounter static conditions both
      here and there, as well as counter currents
      here."

      This would seem to offer reasons—in addi-
      tion to David Bruce's explanation of the diffi-
      culties of translation when the messenger's
      reaction to certain word-symbols fails—for oc-
      casional delays in the transmission of these
      communications.

      "Margaret hasn't tried us yet with an
      antagonistic force on your plane," she said,
      on another occasion. "We don't do it this
      way when the forces there are not harmonious."

      "Is your forward sight much greater than
      ours?" her husband asked. "Or is it, in rela-
      tion to other planes, about what ours is in re- [281]
      gard to yours?"

      "We can see the end as you have not even
      dreamed it yet, but our detailed knowledge is
      limited to two or three planes beyond ours.
      Even here, development is uneven, and some
      of us see farther than others. We are far from
      omniscient or omnipotent. We have advanced
      beyond you, our individual purposes are clear
      where yours are confused, we know where we
      are bound and why, we see much farther ahead
      than you can, and we work in three planes—
      yours as teachers, ours as laborers, and the
      next as students."

      Referring to the statements about Russia,
      of which we had told him, he asked whether
      there were the same relative differences of
      opinion and judgment among them as among
      us, as to psychological policies to be pursued
      for the Great Purpose, and as to the applica-
      tions of those policies on this plane.

      "There are some differences of perception.
      Light, for example, sees shadow and desires
      to dispel it. Truth sees error and wishes to
      correct it. But, broadly speaking, the opin-
      ions are the same. The impediments in the
      path of progress are many. Each purpose
      deals with its own; Light with darkness,
      Truth with error, and so on. Each may work
      in the same field, even in the same individual, [282]
      but here we work for the same ultimate pur-
      pose. We do not disagree. Each follows his
      own work, and recognizes the other's field."

      "We have a united policy," she said, at an-
      other time, "but each our individual applica-
      tion of it in personal relations and messages
      like these. It is all intended to enlighten and
      inspire you, but only in certain fundamental
      and specific matters are we instructed what to
      say."

      "Can you determine time there, by other
      than the memory of it here and by close in-
      spection?" was another question.

      "We have no time here, in your sense. We
      watch you, and remember, but we lose track
      of you, sometimes."

      Mr. Kendal then said—explaining his phrase,
      "close inspection"—that he thought they saw
      time dimly, as we see through water or through
      fog.

      "Is memory with you as acute as answers to
      some of these questions seem to indicate?" one
      of us inquired.

      "Not of material things, generally. We
      don't pay much attention to them, unless they
      interfere with purpose. Just now they are
      interfering a good deal—or were, before the
      war, which is itself a material manifestation of
      purpose." We said that we should have [283]
      thought this interference in full force still, and
      she continued: "The real interference, from
      our point of view, came before the war, when
      the world outside of Germany was too much
      occupied in pursuit of material things to see
      what was happening. They failed even to
      see Germany's intention. Much less did they
      discover their own danger, of which Germany's
      purpose, materially, was the least. The war
      woke them up by degrees, fortunately, or there
      would be no use telling them this."

      A question concerning the possibility of
      communicating with a person recently departed
      from this plane, was met with the statement
      that he had "free communion" still to learn.
      This expression had been used several times
      by others, and now I asked: "Mary, what is
      free communion?"

      "You don't think we vocalize our talk, do
      you?"

      Mansfield suggested that when a man found
      himself suddenly without his material veil, he
      must be at a loss how to proceed, and asked
      whether that was what she meant.

      "Not entirely. The veil isn't missed par-
      ticularly, but there is a . . . a. . . ."

      "Difference of medium?" he asked. "Like
      a water-color artist who can't paint in oil?"

      "That's it." [284]

      "Referring to your assertion in March that
      truth is absolute," he said, "is not truth itself
      relative on this plane? Truth as a statement of
      eternal law is absolute, but when applied to con-
      crete facts and ideas, it changes from time to
      time? That is, a concrete statement which
      expressed the relations of. certain mundane
      conditions to the eternal verities in B.C. 1000,
      would not necessarily be a correct statement
      of the relations of corresponding conditions to
      those verities in the year 1900 A.D."

      "That is the idea on which this whole revela-
      tion is based," she returned. "These things
      have always been true. They would not have
      sounded true in the year one, any more than
      a lot of the 'truths' of that day are true now."

      A night or two after this, he said he would
      like more light on the practical application of
      these principles, especially those in relation to
      freedom. "How, for instance, would you go
      about helping a school?" he asked. "Take, as
      concrete examples, a University like ____, its
      Faculty held in subjection by hidebound
      trustees, and the proposed People's University,
      to be governed from day to day by plebiscite
      or referendum, with no defined policy or pro-
      cedure beyond a general idea of freedom.
      'You may lead a horse to water, but you can't
      make him drink.' Should the construction of [285]
      the trough be left to chance, or should it be
      planned carefully? In other words, should
      mundane provision and prevision be employed
      in building it?"

      "It has been said already that men must
      first learn to think, and to govern themselves,
      before they can be free." It was Mary K.
      who answered. "If experience were not taken
      into consideration, progress would be impos-
      sible. Mundane prevision and provision is
      essential to all constructive activity on your
      plane. Opinions will differ as to ways and
      means of applying principles of progress.
      The first way to help a school is to es-
      tablish unity among the teachers. Not only
      unity of purpose, but a certain large unity of
      method, that one may not tear down what
      his brother builds. Ideals of freedom have
      been confused by men resenting the first law
      of freedom—discipline. Lack of discipline,
      carried to its logical conclusion, would return
      the world to chaos. The school that is free
      in its teaching must be carried on by disciplined
      teachers, united in a purpose of progress clearly
      recognized and agreed upon, to teach discipline
      that the minds of men may dare to be free."

      "The idea underlying that, I take it, is that
      as the athlete whose body is thoroughly trained
      and co-ordinated dares to jump an abyss, [286]
      without fear of falling, so the man whose
      mind and spirit are disciplined can jump an
      intellectual abyss, without losing balance or
      sanity."

      "Yes. And as a man trained to carry great
      weights on his shoulders must be trained to it
      from youth, so the man who would carry gov-
      ernment and freedom of thought must train
      his mind to carry its weight—not alone to
      hold it briefly, but to carry it on."

      "Is it true, then," he asked, "that safe free-
      dom and constructive freedom are only pos-
      sible after prior discipline and self-control?"

      "How can undisciplined freedom be safe or
      constructive? It makes the wilderness. It
      makes the jungle. It makes the uncharted
      and devouring sea."