the figure is perfectly illustrative of the way in which
most of us are interfering with the best use of the life that is ours.

Freedom is obedience to law. A bridge can be built to stand, only in
obedience to the laws of mechanics. Electricity can be made a useful
power only in exact obedience to the laws that govern it, otherwise it
is most destructive. Has man the privilege of disobeying natural laws,
only in the use of his own individual powers? Clearly not. And why is
it that while recognizing and endeavoring to obey the laws of physics,
of mechanics, and all other laws of Nature in his work in the world, he
so generally defies the same laws in their application to his own being?

The freedom of an animal's body in obeying the animal instincts is
beautiful to watch. The grace and power expressed in the freedom of a
tiger are wonderful. The freedom in the body of a baby to respond to
every motion and expression is exquisite to study. But before most
children have been in the world three years their inherited personal
contractions begin, and unless the little bodies can be watched and
trained out of each unnecessary contraction as it appears, and so kept
in their own freedom, there comes a time later, when to live to the
greatest power for use they must spend hours in learning to be babies
all over again, and then gain a new freedom and natural movement.

The law which perhaps appeals to us most strongly when trying to
identify ourselves with Nature is the law of rhythm: action, re-action;
action, re-action; action, re-action,--and the two must balance, so
that equilibrium is always the result. There is no similar thought that
can give us keener pleasure than when we rouse all our imagination, and
realize all our power of identifying ourselves with the workings of a
great law, and follow this rhythmic movement till we find rhythm within
rhythm,--from the rhythmic motion of the planets to the delicate
vibrations of heat and light. It is helpful to think of rhythmic growth
and motion, and not to allow the thought of a new rhythm to pass
without identifying ourselves with it as fully as our imagination will
allow.

We have the rhythm of the seasons, of day and night, of the tides, and
of vegetable and animal life,--as the various rhythmic motions in the
flying of birds. The list will be endless, of course, for the great law
rules everything in Nature, and our appreciation of it grows as we
identify ourselves with it