Speaker 1: Chapter thirty. Will training. It is of the utmost importance
that the individual develop, cultivate, and train his will, so
as to bring it under the influence of the higher
part of his mental and moral being. While the will
is used most effectively in developing and training the intellect
and building character, it itself must be trained by itself
to habitually come under the guidance of the intellect and
under the influence of that which we call character. The
influence of the trained will upon the several mental faculties
is most marked. There are no faculties which may not
be cultivated by the will. The first and great task
of the will in this direction is the control and
direction of the attention. The will determines the kind of
interest that shall prevail at the moment, and the kind
of interest largely determines the character of the man, his tastes,
his feelings, his thoughts, his acts. He says, co operating
with a pre existing influence, the will can make a
weaker one prevail over a stronger. He determines which of
pre existing influences shall have control over the mind. Moreover,
concentrated and continued attention depends entirely upon the exercise of
the will as God. He says, if the will relaxes
its hold upon the activities of the mind, the attention
is liable to be carried away by any one of
the thousands of ideas that the laws of association are
constantly bringing into our minds. Even in the matter of
mental images, the will asserts its sway, and the imagination
may be trained to be the obedient servant of the
developed will. Regarding the influence of the will upon character,
Davidson says, it is not enough for a man to
understand correctly and love duly the conditions of moral life
in his own time. He must still further be willing
and able to fulfill these conditions, and he certainly cannot
do this unless his will is trained to perfect freedom,
so that it responds with the utmost readiness to the
suggestions of his discriminating intelligence and the movements of his
chastened affections. Halleck says, we gradually make our characters by
separate acts of will, just as a blacksmith, by repeated blows,
beats out a horseshoe or an anchor from a shapeless
mass of iron. A finished anchor or horseshoe was never
the product of a single blow. Training the will, perhaps
the best way to train the will is to use
it intelligently and with a purpose. The training of any
faculty of the mind is at the same time a
training of the will. The attention being so closely allied
to the will, it follows that a careful training of
attention will result in a strengthening of the will. The
training the emotional side of one's nature also brings results
in the strengthening of the will. Halleck gives his students
excellent advice regarding the training of the will. It would
be hard to find anything better along these lines than
the following from his pen. Nothing schools the will and
renders it ready for effort in this complex world, better
than accustoming it to face disagreeable things. Professor James advises
all to do something occasionally for no other reason than
that they would rather not do it, if it is
nothing more than giving up a seat in a street car.
He likens such effort to the insurance that a man
pays on his house he has something that he can
fall back on in time of trouble. A will schooled
in this way is always ready to respond, no matter
how great the emergency. While another would be crying over
spilled milk, the possessor of such a will is already
found another cow. The only way to secure such a
will is to practice doing disagreeable things. There are daily opportunities.
A man who had declared his aversion to what he
deemed the dry facts of political economy, was one day
found knitting his brow over a chapter of John Stuart Mill.
When a friend expressed surprise, the man replied, I am
playing the schoolmaster with myself. I am reading this book
because I dislike it. Such a man has the elements
of success in him. On the other hand, the one
who habitually avoids disagreeable action is training his will to
be of no use to him at a time when
supreme effort is demanded. Such a will can never elbow
its way to the front. In life habits habits are
the beaten track over which the will travels. The beaten
path of habit is the line of least resistance to
the will. One who would train his will must needs
pay attention to providing it with the proper mental paths
over which to travel. The rule for the creation of
habits is simply this travel over the mental path as
often as possible. The rule for breaking undesirable habits is
this cultivate the opposite habit. In these two rules is
expressed the gist of what has been written on the subject.
Professor William James has left to the world some invaluable
advice regarding a cultivation of right habits. He bases his
rules upon those of Professor Bain, elaborates these and adds
some equally good ones. We herewith quote freely from both
James and Baine on this subject. It is the best
ever written regarding habit building. One, in the acquisition of
a new habit or the leaving off of an old one,
launch yourself with as strong and decided an initiative as possible.
This will give your new beginning such a momentum that
the temptation to break down will not occur as soon
as if other wise might. And every day during which
a breakdown is postponed adds to the chances of it
not occurring at all. James two, never suffer an exception
to occur till the new habit is securely rooted in
your life. Every lapse is like the letting fall of
a ball of string which one is carefully winding up.
A single slip undoes more than a great many turns
will wind again, James. It is necessary, above all things,
in such a situation never to lose a battle. Every
gain on the wrong side undoes the effect of many
conquests on the right. The essential precaution is so to
regulate the two opposing powers, that the one may have
a series of uninterrupted successes until repetition has fortified it
to such a degree as to enable it to cope
with the opposition under any circumstances. Bain three. Seize the
very first possible opportunity to act on every resolution you make,
and on every emotional prompting you may experience in the
direction of the habits you aspire. Again, it is not
in the moment of their forming, but in the moment
of their producing motor effects, that resolves and aspirations communicate
their new set to the brain, James. The actual presence
of the practical opportunity alone furnishes the fulcrum upon which
the lever can rest, by which the moral will may
multiply its strength and raise itself aloft. He who has
no solid ground to press against will never get beyond
the stage of empty gesture making Bain four. Keep the
faculty alive in you by a little gratuitous exercise every day,
that is, be systematically ascetic or heroic in little unnecessary points.
Do every day something for no other reason than that
you would rather not do it, so that when the
hour of dire need draws nigh, it may find you
not unnerved and untrained to stand the test. The man
who has daily inured himself to habits of concentrated attention,
energetic volition, and self denial in unnecessary things will stand
like a tower when everything rocks around him, and when
his softer fellow mortals are winnowed like chaff in the
blast James end of Chapter thirty Chapter thirty one will Tonic.
In addition to the general rules for developing and training
the will given in the preceding chapter, we ask you
to tone up and strengthen the will by the inspiration to
be derived from the words of some of the world's
great thinkers and doers. In these words, there is such
a vital statement of the recognition, realization, and manifestation of
that something within which we call will, that it is
a dull soul, indeed, which is not inspired by the
contagion of the idea. These expressions are the milestones on
the path of attainment, placed by those who have preceded
us on the journey. We submit these quotations without comment.
They speak for themselves, words of the wise. They can
who think they can. Character is a perfectly educated will.
Nothing can resist the will of a man who knows
what is true, and wills what is good in all difficulties,
advance and will, for within you is a power, a
living force, which, the more you trust and learn to use,
will annihilate the opposition of matter. The star of the
unconquered will. It rises in my breast, serene and resolute,
and still and calm and self possessed. So now is
Grandeur to our dust, Sir, Near is God to man.
When duty whispers low, thou must, the youth replies, I can.
The longer I live, the more certain I am that
the great difference between men, between the feeble and the powerful,
the great and the insignificant, is energy, invincible, determination, a purpose,
once fixed, then death or victory. That quality 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, Buxton the human will, that force, unseen,
the offspring of a deathless soul, can hew a way
to any goal. Though walls of granite intervene. You will
be what you will to be. Let failure find its
false content in that poor word environment. But spirit scorns
it and is free. D It masters time, it conquers space,
It cows at boastful trickster chance, and bids the tyrant
circumstance uncrown and fill a servant's place. 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 in 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. Donald g. Mitchell. There is no chance,
no destiny, no fate can circumvent or hinder or control
the firm resolve of a determined soul gifts count. For
nothing will alone is great. All things give way before
it soon or late. What obstacle can stay the mighty
force of the sea seeking river in its course, or
cause the ascending orb of day to wait? Each well
born soul must win what it deserves. Let the fool's
prate of luck. The fortunate is he whose earnest purpose
never swerves, whose slightest action or inaction serves the one
great aim. Why even death itself stands still and waits
an hour sometimes for such a will, Ella Wheeler Wilcox,
I have brought myself, by long meditation, to the conviction
that a human being with a settled purpose must accomplish it,
and that nothing can resist a will which will stake
even existence upon its fulfillment, Lord Beaconsfield, a passionate desire
and an unwearied will can perform impossibilities, or what may
seem to be such to the cold and feeble Sir
John Simpson, it is wonderful how even the casualties of
life seem to bow to a spirit that will not
bow to them, and yield to subserve a design which
they may, in their first apparent tendency, threaten to frustrate.
When a firm, decisive spirit is recognized, it is curious
to see how the space clears around a man and
leaves him room and freedom. John Foster. The great thing
about General Grant is cruel persistency of purpose. He is
not easily excited, and he has got the grip of
a bull dog. When he once gets his teeth in,
nothing can shake him off. Abraham Lincoln. I am bigger
than anything that can happen to me. All these things
are outside my door, and I've got the key. Man
was meant to be, and ought to be, stronger and
more than anything that can happen to him. Circumstances, fate,
luck are all outside, and if he cannot change them,
he can always beat them. Charles F. Lummis the truest
wisdom is a resolute determination. Impossible is a word found
only in the Dictionary of Fools. Circumstances. I make circumstances, Napoleon,
He who fails only half wills so worrow. That which
the easiest becomes a habit in us is the will.
Learn then to will strongly and decisively. Thus fix your
floating life, and leave it no longer to be carried
hither and thither like a withered leaf by every wind
that blows. Man Owes his growth chiefly to that act
of striving of the will that encounter, which we call effort.
And it is astonishing to find how often results apparently
impracticable are thus made possible. It is will force of
purpose that enables a man to do or be whatever
he sets his mind upon being or doing. A strong,
defiant purpose is many handed and lays hold of whatever
is near that can serve it. It has a magnetic
purpose that draws to itself whatever is kindred. Let it
be your first study to teach the world that you
are not wood and straw, that there is some iron
in you. Munger, it's duggard, as does it Yorkshire proverb.
One talent with a will behind it will accomplish more
than ten without it. As a thimbleful of powder in
a rifle, the bore of whose barrel will give it direction,
will do greater execution than a carload burned in the
open air. O. S. Marden. Will may not endow a
man with talents or capacities, but it does one very
important matter. It enables him to make the best, the
very best of his powers. Fothergill tender handed stroke a nettle,
and it stings you for your pains, Grasp it like
a man of metal and its soft as down remains.
Don't flinch, don't fowl, but hit the line hard, Roosevelt.
The more difficulties one has to encounter, within and without,
the more significant, and the higher an inspiration his life
will be