tinually able
to _enter the Sublime._

_Of the Two Wills_

We have in us two wills. The Will to live, and the Will to love God
and to find Him. The first will we see being used continually and
without ceasing, not only by every man, woman, and child, but by
every beast of the field and the whole of creation.

The Will to live is the will by which all alike seek the best for
themselves, here gaining for themselves all that they can of comfort
and well-being out of the circumstances and opportunities of life.
This is our natural Will. But it is not the will which gains for us
Eternal Life, nor does it even gain for us peace and happiness during
this life. It is this Will to live which in Christ's Process we are taught
to break and bruise till it finally dies, and the Will to love, and
gladly and joyously to please God is the only Will by which we live.

Our great difficulty is that we try at one and the same time to hang
to God with the soul and to the world with our heart. What is
required is not that we go and live in rags in a desert place, but that
in the exact circumstances of life in which we find ourselves we
learn in _everything to place God first._ He requires of us a certain
subtle and inward fidelity--a fidelity of the heart, the will, the mind.
The natural state of heart and mind in which we all normally find
ourselves is to have temporary vague longings for something which,
though indefinable, we yet know to be better and more satisfying
than anything we can find in the world. This is the soul, trying to
overrule the frivolity of the heart and mind and to re-find God. Our
difficulties are not made of great things, but of the infinitely small
our own caprices. Though we can often do great things, acts of
surprising heroism, we are held in chains--at once elastic and iron--of
small capricious vanities, so that in one and the same hour we
may have wonderful, far-reaching aspirations towards the Sublime,
and God; and yet there comes a pretty frock, a pleasant companion,
and behold God is forgotten! The mighty and marvellous Maker of
the Universe, Lord of everything, is placed upon one side for a piece
of chiffon, a flattering word from a passing lover.

So be it. He uses no force. We are still in the Garden of Free-Will.
And when the Garden closes down for us, what then? Will chiffon
help us? Will the smiles of a long-since faithless lover be our
strength? Now is the time to decide; but our decision is made