all indissolubly bound
together and having mutual relations. With the dawn of intelligence
comes the realization of relations. This realization is dim at the
first, but it is very real. Soon the soul learns that the relations
between it and other souls are so intimate that the interest of one is
the interest of all. Appreciation of relations is a long advance in the
movement upward, and it necessitates other knowledge. The realization of
relations leads, necessarily and swiftly, to the consciousness of
responsibility. The process of this growth cannot be described in
detail, but the path is clearly marked and its milestones may be
numbered. Each soul is always in a society of souls. Each one,
therefore, affects others, and is affected by them. It is free and,
therefore, responsible for the influence which it exerts. Moreover, it
is bound to other souls by love, and love always carries with it the
possibility of sorrow; for sorrow is usually only love thwarted. It is
not far from the truth to say that when there is no love there is no
sorrow, and that the possibilities of sorrow are always increased in
proportion to the perfection of being.

In time the soul finds itself not only one among myriads of souls, but
it realizes that its relations to some are more intimate than to
others. It needs not to seek the causes of this fact, since it cannot
escape from the reality. Thus it finds itself in families, in tribes, in
nations, in social groups where the bonds are strong and enduring.

Some souls, more capacious than others, have a richer and more varied
experience, and thus inevitably become teachers. The process goes on,
and, with both teachers and scholars, the horizon expands and the
strength increases with each new day. The soul has found that it is not
a solitary being dazed and saddened by the consciousness of its powers,
but that it is in a society in which all are similarly endowed, and that
all are pressing toward the same goal. It has discovered that its growth
is hastened, or hindered, by its environment; and that the spiritual
environment is ever the nearest and most potent.

Each new step in this pilgrim's progress reveals something more
wonderful than the opening of a continent. It is an entrance into a
larger and more complex world. A strange fact now emerges. Every
enlargement of being, either of faculty or capacity, is attended by pain
either physical or mental. "Whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth," seem