as a poison, in turn. It is an implement,
a thing which is used, evidently. What
we desire to discover is, who is the user; what
part of ourselves is it that demands the
presence of this thing so hateful to the rest?

Medicine is used by the physician, the knife
by the surgeon; but the weapon of destruction
is used by the enemy, the hater.

Is it, then, that we do not only use means,
or desire to use means, for the benefit of our
souls, but that also we wage warfare within
ourselves, and do battle in the inner sanctuary?
It would seem so; for it is certain that if man's
will relaxed with regard to it he would no
longer retain life in that state in which pain
exists. Why does he desire his own hurt?

The answer may at first sight seem to be
that he primarily desires pleasure, and so is
willing to continue on that battlefield where
it wages war with pain for the possession of
him, hoping always that pleasure will win the
victory and take him home to herself. This is
but the external aspect of the man's state. In
himself he knows well that pain is co-ruler
with pleasure, and that though the war wages
always it never will be won. The superficial
observer concludes that man submits to the
inevitable. But that is a fallacy not worthy
of discussion. A little serious thought shows
us that man does not exist at all except by
exercise of his positive qualities; it is but
logical to suppose that he chooses the state
he will live in by the exercise of those same
qualities.

Granted, then, for the sake of our argument,
that he desires pain, why is it that he
desires anything so annoying to himself?

II

If we carefully consider the constitution of
man and its tendencies, it would seem as if
there were two definite directions in which he
grows. He is like a tree which strikes its roots
into the ground while it throws up young
branches towards the heavens. These two lines
which go outward from the central personal
point are to him clear, definite, and intelligible.
He calls one good and the other evil. But
man is not, according to any analogy, observation,
or experience, a straight line. Would
that he were, and that life, or progress, or
development, or whatever we choose to call it,
meant merely following one straight road or
another, as the religionists pretend it does.
The whole question, the mighty problem,
would be very easily solved then. But it is not
so easy to go to hell as preachers declare it
to