olitude of Self--blank solitude without
fixed objects to amuse, without fixed Beauty to lead higher, to
restore, to calm. Is all this tantamount to saying that when separated
from God Spirit-life is less desirable than earth-life? It is: for then
we are "dead" to celestial-living, and in Spirit-life all other living is
miserable living. Hence we see the dire necessity of the soul for a
Saviour: the necessity of fixed forms, of time, of flesh (which is a
fixed stay-point for the soul), of the Incarnation of the Saviour _in
flesh_ in order that He may guide the soul amongst these fixed
forms, Himself showing her which to choose and which to cast aside:
we see the necessity of time in order that, though we have an
ungodly thought, we have _time_ to repent and choose a better
before, in a horrible rapidity, we are inevitably _become that which
we had thought._ In this world, this stay-point for the soul, the most
lost is enabled to enjoy and perceive Beauty and Goodness. How
much more easy, then, to return to godly thoughts, to the Good, to
God Himself! But though her Saviour is in this world so near to the
soul, she does not always seek Him. He belongs to the Invisible.
Intoxicated at finding herself amused amongst fixed objects which
she enjoys lazily through fixed mediums of the five senses, she
devotes herself to these objects, surrounds herself with them, forgets
everything else. "It is harder for the rich man to enter the kingdom
of heaven." But she must abandon object-worship: this is not to say
she is to deny the existence of objects, calling them unreal; she must
despise no created object, for each is there to form for her an
object-lesson. She has two choices: she can see the objects, remain
satisfied with them, and seek no further. Or, she can see the objects,
admire them, but seek beyond them for their Instigator and Creator. Now
she is on the track of God. All is well.

But all this is not that Adam may recover his perfection, for when,
and for how long, was Adam "Perfect"? We behold him sinning at
the very first opportunity. In the Fall of Adam we see merely the
continuation in the stay-point of time and of flesh, of the history of
the fallen soul--sinning the same old sin, Self-will.

The way of return to God is the same way by which we came out
from Him--reversed. We came away by means of greeds and
curiosities imagined by Self-will. The return is by casting away
these greeds, casting away all prides, all