lly-trained condition. His master could now always rely upon him. A
dog always ready, always faithful and self-forgetful, was then set
apart into a still smaller and more (s)elect group and surrounded
with most especial care and love. Never would it want for anything.
In this there was justice. Forsaking all their natural ways, these dogs
had submitted themselves wholly, in loving willingness, to their
master's will, and he in return would lavish all his best on them. It
was but just. Oh, how my heart leaped over it! At last I understood--for
as the dog, so the human creature. We become chosen souls,
not for our own sakes (which had always seemed to me such
favouritism), but for our willingness to learn our Master's Will. And
what is His will and what is His work? Of many, many kinds, and
this is shown to the soul in her training. But the hardest to learn is
not that of the worker, but of the messenger and lover. As the
messenger, to take His messages, in whatever direction, instantly
and correctly, and to take back the answer from man to Himself--which
is to say, to hold before Him the needs of man on the fire of
the soul, known to most persons under the name of prayer. And as
the lover, to sing to Him with never-failing joyful love and thanks.

But the learning and work of the soul is not so simple as that of the
dog, who carries the message in writing upon his collar. The soul
can have no written paper to assist her, and long and painful is her
training; and exquisitely sweet it is when, having swiftly and
accurately taken the message, she waits before Him for the rapture
of those caresses that she knows so well.

How I was spurred! For I said, "Shall dogs outdo us in love and
devotion?" Only in a condition of total submission, self-forgetfulness,
self-abnegation, can the soul either receive or deliver her
message. In this way she is justified of the joys of her election.
The dog, faithful in all ways to his master, receives in return all
praise and all meats, whatever he desires. The faithful soul also
receives all praise and all meats, both spiritual and carnal, for
nothing of earthly needs will lack her _if she asks_; and without
asking, her needs are mysteriously and completely given her. Her
spiritual meats are, in this world, peace, joy, ecstasy, rapture; and of
the world to come it is written that eye hath not seen, nor ear heard,
neither have entered into the heart of man, the things that God has
prepared f