the various points of
action, but sends its messengers and couriers there to carry out its
orders. Buxton has said: "The Will will do anything that can be done in
this world. And no talents, no circumstances, no opportunities will
make a two-legged creature a Man without it." Ik Marvel truly says:
"Resolve is what makes a man manifest; not puny resolve, not crude
determinations, not errant purpose--but that strong and indefatigable
Will which treads down difficulties and danger, as a boy treads down the
heaving frost-lands of winter; which kindles his eye and brain with a
proud pulse-beat toward the unattainable. Will makes men giants."

The great obstacle to the proper use of the Will, in the case of the
majority of people, is the lack of ability to focus the attention. The
Yogis clearly understand this point, and many of the _Raja Yoga_
exercises which are given to the students by the teachers, are designed
to overcome this difficulty. Attention is the outward evidence of the
Will. As a French writer has said: "The attention is subject to the
superior authority of the Ego. I yield it, or I withhold it, as I please.
I direct it in turn to several points. I concentrate it upon each point
as long as my Will can stand the effort." Prof. James has said: "The
essential achievement of the Will, when it is most voluntary, is to
attend to a difficult object, and hold it fast before the mind. Effort of
Attention is the essential phenomenon of the Will." And Prof. Halleck
says: "The first step toward the development of Will lies in the exercise
of Attention. Ideas grow in distinctness and motor-power as we attend to
them. If we take two ideas of the same intensity and center the attention
upon one, we shall notice how much it grows in power." Prof. Sully says:
"Attention may be roughly defined as the active self-direction of the
mind to any object which presents itself at the moment." The word
"Attention" is derived from two Latin words, _ad tendere_, meaning "to
stretch towards," and this is just what the Yogis know it to be. By means
of their psychic or clairvoyant sight, they see the thought of the
attentive person stretched out toward the object attended to, like a
sharp wedge, the point of which is focused upon the object under
consideration, the entire force of the thought being concentrated at that
point. This is true not only when the person is considering an object,
but when he is earnestly impressing his ideas upon ano