Thou wilt shew me the path of life.—Psalms, xvi. 11
NOTHING so stirs the heart with gratitude as the thought of the Great Souls who have opened the Path, who keep it open, and who guide the steps of the hungry searching multitude to its entrance. They have carved the way through the rock of matter. They have waded through the mires of delusion. They have cleared away the confusing and entangling underbrush of doubt. They have hewn down the mighty obstructions. With dauntless courage each one has destroyed the dragon which guarded the treasure from himself, thus inspiring all who follow. They have erected signposts all along the journey, and with their hearts' blood have written thereon the messages which every pilgrim may read, and so avoid one step amiss. Not only this, but having achieved the goal, they have retraced their steps again and again, to direct the uncertain feet of the children of earth, to combat ignorance, vice, and injustice; to encourage, uplift, and teach. Though unseen in many times and places, it is they who keep the lights burning.
Terrible as are the difficulties, the discouragements, the disasters, which the human children encounter, it is the Great Souls who prevent them from being impossible; who ward off the clouds of despair lest they settle over the globe like a pall of darkness paralysing all effort. Without these Elder Brothers all would be lost in the labyrinth of matter, never finding the thread which could lead them out. But to be without them is inconceivable, unthinkable; for all must sometime find the Path and tread it. No means have been omitted to make it plain. All nature exists but to point the way. All experiences, all events, difficulties, disappointments, all good, as well as so-called bad fortune: all tend to the same issue. It has been described in every language of heart or head, that all, even the beasts of the fields, in some vague way, may hear and gradually understand.
One of those who has gone before and returned to show the path to others, said: "I am the Way." Another, with a different sidelight on the same truth, said: "Each man is to himself absolutely the way." For each one in traveling it, does so by passing through the mazes of his own personality, first as one blindfolded, then as one slowly awakening to its meaning, and finally as one consciously subduing and transmuting it. And when he has reached the goal, he becomes the way. His whole being is an expression, an exposition of the way—the mystic Path, which lies within and yet without; which is so far, and yet so near. Light on the Path expresses it as follows:
Seek out the way.... Seek it not by any one road. To each temperament there is one road which seems the most desirable. But the way is not found by devotion alone, by religious contemplation alone, by ardent progress, by self-sacrificing labor, by studious observation of life. None alone can take the disciple more than one step onward. All steps are necessary to make up the ladder. The vices of men become steps in the ladder, one by one, as they are surmounted. The virtues of men are steps indeed, necessary—not by any means to be dispensed with. Yet, though they create a fair atmosphere, and a happy future, they are useless if they stand alone. The whole nature of man must be used wisely by the one who desires to enter the way.
SAN DIEGO: by Kenneth Morris
