Among all men and conditions of men we find that those who are bewailing their fate, or as they put it, the way the world has treated them, feel in their hearts they have not received and are not receiving the just rewards for their toil and effort. It seems that many become professional growlers because they compare their work with the work of others and their rewards with the rewards of others, and feel themselves overshadowed. Were these people to look back over their lives and trace again their pathway step by step, doubtless they would find that early they began to make these comparisons, arriving at conclusions unfavorable to themselves. As time passed on, they, by an unfailing law, grew bitter through such habits of thought and speech and became more vigorous in their denunciation of others, who were seemingly more favored by luck or fate, and life's duties became to them year by year more and more arduous tasks.

The present age has been called a psychic one; and, although the marked characteristics of every age may be distinguished by one's ability to appropriate the treasures in his soul, yet there are periods when the soul seems more responsive to objective consciousness than at others. That period has been entered during the last decade; and, for the next ten years great progress should be made by man generally because he is becoming acquainted with his true selfhood and learning to use powers within him which have been dormant till now.

I do not want to offend; but the elementary teachings of the Christian church have been promises of reward for good work and punishment for bad. In a certain sense this doubtless is true; but when these theorists make Infinity a personality, who himself has made certain laws, and having made those laws demands their being obeyed by his creations, offering reward if they are kept, and assuring in the same breath that punishment will follow if they are not, then man, following that philosophy, must lose his own individuality and independence and subject himself to a power which, as defined by orthodox theology, is both whimsical and tyrannical.

With the broader views of the present age, we hear less from our pulpits of the punishments God will inflict and less of the rewards he will give. In short, in spite of all the dogmas re ligion has been called upon to protect, it is now beginning to be recognized generally that man must indeed work out his own salvation. When a broader philosophy is embraced, it will show that the infinite force of the universe, whatever it may be, is always working for the progression and advancement of every thing that grows, and every being that possesses life. The whole purpose of infinite force is to protect and to unfold. If humanity, as a whole, would see in this infinite force which is called God, an undefined all-pervading entity beyond man's complete grasp with his present unfoldment, but yet a force to which he is bound by indestructible bonds and a force on which he may call for help and aid, because he is one with it, then would man realize his place in the universe and grasp the mightiness of the absoluteness of law, and of eternal justice.

One's growth depends upon placing himself in harmonious relations with this infinite force. How long it may take for man to outgrow the environment surrounding him and to fully appreciate his oneness with that mighty power which protects and o'ershadows all, may be a question. However, to me it seems that many who are known as advanced thought people have already reached that point, and their thoughts are being suggested to human minds throughout the world, and those thoughts are taking root, and in due time will bear fruit for all who think and work and love. Until one can grasp this truth, I cannot see what hope he has of attaining his desires, except by the hard and slow and indefinite methods which have been followed so long.

Could man awaken to the fact that the infinite force of the universe knows only love, and that its one purpose is to uplift those who come within its vibrations, then is one's own thinking transformed completely. He has no battle with fate, no battle with fear, no battle with wrong. The Infinite is sending forth its vibrations to help him. Whether or not he places himself in position to secure this aid depends in no way upon the Infinite - it depends only upon himself. This conception of infinite force I recognize gives one the poetic view of God. In this day of advancement, thinkers claim that the inspired writers who gave us this poetic idea of God were those who harmonized themselves with the vibrations from that eternal Source, and then they received and presented truth. More stoical philosophers came later, and in their cold study of humanity, its desires, hopes, failures, rebuffs and sufferings, their narrow intelligences divined the causes of all these to be the acts of the infinite force that alone decided what compensation was due, and alone possessed the power of reward and punishment. Reasoning as they did, with their limited and circumscribed intelligences, this was perhaps the best they could do to define the cause, in order to account for the effect. To-day, if one would advance he must come to a study of his real selfhood and learn from the open book of life that is before him. The book is wider open to him than it was to those early teachers and students. Man has, by evolution, become a greater and a grander being. It is doubtless true that the man of average intelligence to-day possesses millions more of brain cells than he who embraced the philosophy of that early day. Truth is eternal, but man's comprehension of it is limited and circumscribed in proportion to his own mental unfolding.

As long as man recognizes a ruling intelligence with arbitrary ideas and purposes of its own regarding man, so long will he continue a struggle within himself for advancement, mingled with doubt and fears as to whether or not he is working in accordance with the purpose of that all-powerful ruler. If failure come, he may ascribe the cause to be that his hopes and ambi tions were not in harmony with the purpose of the Master. Perplexed with doubt, he may seek guidance from that great Unknown by methods handed down through church dogmas; and after working hope into half-belief, he thus starts forward to accomplishment with questionings even as to the wisdom of the attainment sought. He feels he cannot compass infinite mind, he fears to oppose it, and so energy is scattered for lack of concentration.