"[99]

This is simply a striking instance of a process which is always taking
place in every one of us, for good or evil. The deeper mind opens to all
who knock; provided only that the new-comers be not the enemies of some
stronger habit or impression already within. To suggestions which
coincide with the self's desires or established beliefs it gives an easy
welcome; and these, once within, always tend to self-realization. Thus
the French Carmelite Therese de l'Enfant-Jesus, once convinced that she
was destined to be a "victim of love," began that career of suffering
which ended in her death at the age of twenty-four.[100] The lives of
the Saints are full of incidents explicable on the same lines:
exhibiting again and again the dramatic realization of traditional ideas
or passionate desires. We see therefore that St. Paul's admonition
"Whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever
things be of good report, think on these things" is a piece of practical
advice of which the importance can hardly be exaggerated; for it deals
with the conditions under which man makes his own mentality.

Suggestion, in fact, is one of the most powerful agents either of
self-destruction or of self-advancement which are within our grasp: and
those who speak of the results of psycho-therapy, or the certitudes of
religious experience, as "mere suggestion" are unfortunate in their
choice of an adjective. If then we wish to explore all those mental
resources which can be turned to the purposes of the spiritual life,
this is one which we must not neglect. The religious idea, rightly
received into the mind and reinforced by the suggestion of regular
devotional exercises, always tends to realize itself. "Receive His
leaven," says William Penn, "and it will change thee, His medicine and
it will cure thee. He is as infallible as free; without money and with
certainty. Yield up the body, soul and spirit to Him that maketh all
things new: new heaven and new earth, new love, new joy, new peace, new
works, a new life and conversation."[101] This is fine literature, but
it is more important to us to realize that it is also good psychology:
and that here we are given the key to those amazing regenerations of
character which are the romance and glory of the religious life.
Pascal's too celebrated saying, that if you will take holy water
regularly you will presently believe, witnesses on another level to the
same truth.

Fears have b